Skywing
by john4096
Summary: Sifting through the echoes of the future, troubling thoughts cling to Zephyr's mind. He knows Goth must be stopped, and it is his duty to guide Marina and her son to his defeat, but the fears taking over his mind just can't be ignored.
1. Chapter 1: Ensnared

_Author's Note: Despite my initial reluctance to the subject, this is my idea of a sequel to Firewing. It ended up way longer than I had anticipated, but I'm happy with it nonetheless. I hope you all like it. As a side-note, this is somewhat preceeded by my other story, Before Dawn. While it is perfectly acceptable for you to read this without reading before Dawn First, it may or may not add to the story (but you won't lose any plot points, so it's completely optional). Additionally, I fear that the earlier chapters might be a little slow. If that's the case, please stick with it, because things really pick up near the end. Anyway, as always, I hope you enjoy it, and please review!_

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><p><span>Skywing<span>

**Chapter 1: Ensnared**

The wolf lay lazily in her warm bed of moss, thankful that the full winter cold had not yet set in. The ground was still warm and there were plenty of fallen leaves to use for insulation as she rested. It was so calming that her eyes began to droop tiredly from the soothing heat, and she had to shake her head a little to stay awake. If only she could just drift off to sleep right now.

With a reluctant sigh, she lifted her head slightly to watch over her cubs, hunting on their own for the first time. They stalked and scoured through the wilting grass and barren trees for their elusive prey, hardly having any luck. The forests were unusually scarce for the time of year, and it seemed that her children would not be getting much practice.

Suddenly, a small yelp made the wolf turn her head, her eyes probing the area where she had seen a short flash of movement just a moment ago. There, through the sparsely grown trees, she could see the small outline of one of her excited cubs, thrashing around wildly. By looks of it, her youngest son had caught something. Loath to leave her comfy nest, she rose to her feet very slowly, trying to get a good look at her son's prey as she took a few steps forward.

As the cub came into view, she smiled: it seemed, rather, that something had caught her son.

Somehow, the poor pup had gotten himself tangled in a clump of twisting vines and was now struggling furiously against their tight grip. Smiling and shaking her head fondly, the mother made her way over to help, walking leisurely and taking her time. Children were always tripping on things or getting ensnared in something, and it always amused her how they would twist and yelp and struggle as though it was a live creature had them in its grips.

The cub was still howling terribly when she finally reached him, and she tried to soothe him with a calming nuzzle before bending down to tear the vines. It was difficult for her to get her teeth near the pup's binds with him thrashing around so feverishly, but she finally found a clear spot to clamp down. Careful not to bite her son, she closed her jaws around the leafy things, ready to shear them with her serrated teeth. They didn't feel very thick, really—it was surprising that her son hadn't been able to tear himself free by now. She was about to bite down and sever the creepers when something made her pause.

The vines were moving through her teeth.

Her son hadn't simply entangled himself in these vines: they had _attacked_ him! Even now, she could she the things twisting around the pup's ankles, tightening around his middle, and just as the impossibility of the situation finally began to register in the wolf's mind, the bindings tightened further still around her son, strengthening their hold and squeezing hard.

For a moment she couldn't even move, so terribly afraid was she of these alien things that had a hold of her son, but as the pup let out another anguished yell, she channeled her fear into grim determination. These things would not take her child.

She viciously hacked with her teeth and sawed with her claws, watching in satisfaction as the vines withered and loosened everywhere she struck. Never once did the thought that they might attack her instead ever enter her mind as the bizarre, winding ropes shied away from her every touch.

She began to grow considerably more confident with each blow she struck against the living, moving vines, certain that she would soon have her son free. However, when she glanced up to check her progress, she stared dumbfounded at her cub, who was somehow bound even more tightly than before; and still, more creepers descended on the child. Hardly any of his fur showed through the narrowing spaces, his head the only part of his body still fully visible. His yells had grown weaker.

With a sense of bleak hopelessness, the mother watched as her pup was dragged away from her, still howling piercingly, and she knew that she was helpless to stop them. She felt a dreadful weight press down on her chest as her son's writhing body was dragged morbidly through a small opening at the base of a thick spruce tree. With a mournful howl, she chased after the cub in desperation, but the gap was too small for her to follow.

The last she saw of her cub was his terror-stricken eyes, beseeching her as he was pulled through the hole. A strange sucking noise was all that remained as he disappeared below the surface.


	2. Chapter 2: Migration

**Chapter 2: Migration**

Cold. The only thing Griffin could register was that everything was cold: the stiff branches where he roosted during the day, the dry insects he ate at night, the air that churned beneath his wings as he flew…and above all, _he_ was cold. Each beat of his wings felt like icicles breaking along his bones, an ominous cracking sound reverberating off the membrane. For the first time in his life, he was glad to have his mother's thick fur, ridiculous as it looked amongst his coat of silver.

The colony had left Tree Haven two nights ago, and had already reunited with the males at Stone Hold. They had left shortly afterwards, adhering to the same schedule they always kept, and yet somehow, the weather was much worse this year. The cold had been relentless, and the wind had shrieked endlessly in their ears. There was virtual no limit to the blistering snowflakes that perpetually littered their thin, vulnerable wings, weighing them down and sucking the heat from their bodies. All too soon, the colony had found itself trying fervently to outrun the winter freeze as more and more bats developed frostbite on the exposed areas of their skin.

Compulsively checking his own wings, Griffin could see sharp, glittering shards of ice embedded in his frozen fur, whistling from time to time as he flew. _How did those get there?_ he wondered, fearfully imagining more pellets of ice sticking to his fur as he flew, building until his entire body was encased in crystal white.

As the familiar tremors of panic began to set in, he started to rock his body back and forth, frantically trying to dislodge the glinting frost, completely oblivious to how silly he must look.

"Griff," he heard Luna ask beside him, "what are you doing?"

"I can't get this ice out of my fur!" he explained, his voice quivering slightly with his movements.

She laughed. "It's just a bit of frozen water."

"Oh sure," he said sarcastically, "it's just a bit of frozen water until—"

He turned his head pointedly and almost feinted when he saw her. She was almost entirely white, as though she had just been through a blizzard.

"You're covered too!" he exclaimed.

She looked down at herself, looking mildly amused as she shrugged. "Can't really feel it even."

"But what if it keeps building up?" Griffin began speculating, "and all those little shards freeze together until you're coated in ice, like those fish that get stuck when they swim too close to the surface of the river!"

She gave another and shrug shook her fur luxuriously, as though demonstrating.

"See?" she asked with grin as a stream of glistening crystals showered towards the ground. "Nothing to worry about."

Griffin smiled appreciatively, feeling his fears subside a little. He loved how she was always able to make him feel better, and it was more of a necessity to him than a luxury. In fact, if Luna hadn't been around to calm him down every now and then, he never would've made it through his first migration.

"I'll admit," Griffin conceded after he shook the crystals from his own fur, "ice is definitely less scary that undead, cannibal bats."

"Yeah," Luna agreed, "but it's kinda boring in contrast, don't you think?"

Griffin shook his head seriously, his eyes wide. "Boring is good. Boring is safe. I like boring."

"Well, you like me," Luna said, raising an eyebrow inquisitively. "Does that mean I'm boring too?"

He chuckled. "You're so far from boring, I don't know how I survive from one night to the next."

She turned to give him one of those warm, friendly smiles—one he swore could melt away the ice weighing him down in instant. That smile could boil water.

She pulled over and nuzzled him quickly before they were buffeted away from each other by a particularly nasty gust of wind, sending up a terrible shriek from the ice crystals in their fur. They spearheaded their way through the screaming air in silence for a while before Luna spoke up again.

"I still wish something exciting would happen for once," she sighed. "I could use a good bat-eating cactus right about now."

At this, Griffin shot her a concerned look, not liking the disappointment in her voice. He knew she was just joking—that wasn't really what worried him. What truly made him anxious was that he kind of agreed with her. It was always the same thing: they would meet up at Stone Hold, migrate down to Hibernaculum, sleep for the winter, travel back to Tree Haven, spend a few weeks together, and then he would go to Stone Hold alone while Luna stayed behind with the females. He wasn't exactly yearning for adventure and excitement, but it was hard even for him to see the point in it all.

Before he could say anything, though, he was jerked out of his reverie by a voice from behind.

"How are you two holding out?" the caring tone rang out. It was one Griffin recognized well, and he felt glad to see her as a bright-furred bat pulled up beside the two mates.

It was his mother, Marina, and to his mild dismay, she too was covered in ice—though not quite as extensively as Luna. Nonetheless, it was comforting to have her around like this, as though her presence could help him forget the diminished but painful hole in his heart.

It was not unusual for his mother to check up on the two of them so frequently, and she did have good reason—the last time she lost track of him, he had fallen into the Underworld of Zotz and narrowly escaped with his life. In fact, he was surprised that she could stand to let him out of her sight for more than a second at a time, even if he was no longer a naïve, frightened newborn—well, not a newborn anyway.

"Are you feeling okay?" she asked.

"We're fine," Griffin answered casually, trying to sound composed. "Just the usual cold."

"And the usual worrying," Luna added in exaggerated exasperation, and she and Marina broke out into laughter at Griffin's expense. This was not uncommon for him, and he forced himself to join in too—he _did_ have a habit of over-analyzing things.

"Well, maybe this will make you feel better, Griffin," his mother offered with a smile. "We've almost reached the city."

"Already?" Luna asked, surprised.

"Fortunately, we've had a pretty strong tailwind up until now," Marina said. "We should reach the spire before sunrise."

This made Griffin finally feet slightly relieved—probably for the first time since leaving Stone Hold, he realized. He liked the spire. It was warm, and dry, and safe, and it was of the few places where he found that he wasn't always afraid of everything. More so even than that, he especially liked the bat who lived in the spire, sheltering and directing the hundreds of traveling colonies along their tiring hibernation journeys.

A very strange-looking albino bat with unbelievably sensitive ears, Zephyr had a vast knowledge of everything Griffin could possibly imagine, and then some. He had always admired how the old bat was always so calm and so confident—as though he didn't even know what it meant to worry or be afraid.

Zephyr would also share stories of his father whenever he visited, and Griffin always found himself so inexplicably drawn to these stories, despite the peril and danger that normally put him off. In fact, he remembered the first time he had met the keeper of the spire, back on his very first migration. His mother had told him that Zephyr could see into the past, the present, and even the future with his sensitive ears, so Griffin had felt compelled to ask whether he would make it to Hibernaculum safely. He had asked the wise old bat the same question every year since.

The show was not quite attuned to Griffin's liking: always very dramatic, and always the same. Zephyr would raise his wings over his head seriously, hiding his face and flaring his ears, and he would speak in a very rough, breathy tone that was quite unlike his usual voice. After a few seconds of intense concentration and unintelligible muttering, he would always give the same cryptic reply: "It is still too early, young one. Your journey will be without trouble this time."

Luna, of course, was always fascinated by Zephyr's cryptic messages and dramatic performance, and his mother had insisted that it was simply Zephyr's way; but Griffin found that these mysterious words only made him feel even more anxious—if that were at all possible.

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><p>Even with his eyes closed and his ears pinned down flat, Griffin could practically <em>feel <em>the intense city glow shining off of the bright patches in his fur. As much as he liked the spire, Griffin positively hated the city. The air was sooty, the Human machines were loud, it was never dark, and there were always patrol after patrol of pigeons. _How could anyone stand to live in such a place?_ he always wondered; and yet, it seemed to grow more and more crowded every year.

"I must look ridiculous right now," Griffin said, glancing down at his positively sparkling body.

"Don't be silly, Griff," Luna said brightly. "You're just as handsome as you always are. Although," she added thoughtfully, "you do look almost like your glowing again."

"Hmm," Griffin responded, not quite wanting to be reminded of the Underworld. "I just don't like how obvious I am to the pigeons."

He lowered his voice anxiously as they soared by a small military outpost, keeping a worried eye on the passing patrols as they flew by along straight, disciplined paths—following the Human roads, he realized suddenly. Their imposing figures and strangely hypnotic eyes were always so quick to unnerve him.

He knew the two species were at peace, and had been for a few years now, but Griffin could never quite shirk the instinctual fear of these birds that were so many times his own size—and so precisely organized.

"There are quite a few of them this time," Luna agreed, grinning at him slyly. "They must've had an exciting spring."

Griffin grimaced slightly, caught severely off guard by her joke as he forced out an uncomfortable chuckle. She had been making a lot of remarks along those lines lately, and it really bothered him—just another thing to add to his long list of worries.

Obviously, the idea of mating with Luna and raising a newborn was possibly the most frightening thing he could imagine. There were so many things that could go wrong, so many opportunities for him to mess up—how could he ever be confident that he wouldn't fail? The worst part was that Luna knew all too well how much even the thought along embarrassed him, and yet she never let up. In fact, he could almost swear that she thoroughly enjoyed making him feel uneasy. Maybe that's why she had hung around with him so much back when they were newborns.

"Now that you mention it, Luna," Marina said grimly, pulling up beside them again, "I've never seen this many pigeons in the city before, even when the owls closed the night skies. It's very strange." Catching the look on Griffin's face she added calmly, "But I'm sure it's nothing to worry about."

"Yeah," Griffin replied sarcastically, hardly feeling any better, "big, highly organized birds, large enough to kill you, multiplying rapidly and patrolling around every corner…yeah, nothing to worry about at all, mom!"

"Oh, Griffin. It'll be fine," his mother laughed, eyeing him sadly. "There's so much of your father in you, it's scary sometimes."

"Don't say that," Luna warned seriously. "Or you'll make him afraid of _himself _next."

With that, they were laughing at him once again, and Griffin just sighed wearily. Of course he always had to be the one to over-think things, always had to be the one to fret. _Maybe I really should stop worrying so much_, Griffin thought to himself, _I mean, it's not like anything bad ever actually happens_.

"Come on, Griff," Luna teased, nudged him when they finally finished laughing. "Cheer up. I can see the spire over there."

He looked up hopefully and at last he felt a genuine, worry-free smile creep across his face.

It was quite a sight to behold. Ahead of them, a single, winding tower rose into the sky, climbing high above the surrounding Human structures. From its formidable peak rose a tall, gleaming cross, a thick stone ledge running beneath it. The ledge tapered at the edge, four imposing gargoyles decorating its corners as though guarding the spire from attack.

With a bit of an inward chuckle, Griffin remembered how the stone creatures had almost given him a heart attack when he had first spotted them so many years ago. They were scary enough looking things—so much so that the pigeons still stayed well clear of them—and even now, Griffin felt some trepidation as he approached the stone beasts, their fangs bared and their wings extended.

Suddenly, in the corner of his eye, he saw his mother shiver slightly beside him as though cold. The action struck him as odd as the air had grown considerably warmer since reaching the city.

"What's the matter?" he asked her concernedly.

"I'm not sure," she answered, staring strangely at the towering spire. "There's just something eerily familiar about all this." As an afterthought, she added, "I'm sure its nothing. I'm probably just a little cold still."

Thankfully, Griffin didn't have any room left in his worry-ridden mind for his mother's odd premonition as he flew through the gargoyle's open jaws and into the heart of the spire.


	3. Chapter 3: Amis

**Chapter 3: Amis**

The sound of the insects was deafening in his ears, hazing over his echo vision as he glided. It was terribly distracting, and for a moment he lost sight of his target. Shaking his head vigorously, he forced himself to focus only on his prey, flying on ahead of him, its wings a blur. The poor, unsuspecting thing hadn't noticed him and was just soaring along contentedly, completely unaware of the danger it was in.

It was a sizeable catch—nice and fat—and his mouth began to water in anticipation. The hunting would be a little tricky, but he had no doubt in his stealth as the sun dipped out of sight and his jet-black fur blended into the night sky.

He stole himself for a moment, taking a deep breath of fresh air, feeling the powerful muscles in his chest as he pumped his wings. The moon peeked out from behind a cloud for a moment, and the light reflected briefly off of the bright, curved streaks of fur propagating out along his wing-membranes. Then, the sky closed up and, cloaked in darkness once again, he rose slightly to observe his target from above.

Singling out its larger form from amongst the swelling hoard of insects filling his echo vision, he trimmed his wings and made chase, soaring smoothly and quietly. Still slightly high, he dove, his target drawing closer as the wind gusted against his face. He would be upon it in seconds. A few more wingbeats and it would never know what hit it.

Pulling up on his mark at last, he lunged, snapping his jaws shut around the creature and feeling it writhe fearfully inside his mouth. Wasting no time, he bit down hard with a satisfying crunch, and his hunger flared as the prey's savory blood trickled down his throat. As his catch went still, he set down eagerly on the forest floor to tear into his prize, looking it over before he started.

It was a bird, he saw. A fine specimen too, strong and sizeable—old enough that the meat wasn't stringy, but young enough that it wasn't yet tough. It had been quite a long chase to catch it, but it was well worth it. Overall, it was a thoroughly pleasing meal, and he took some pride in his refined hunting technique. He knew all too well that few Vampyrum his age could take down such a large creature as he had, and it made the taste all the more satisfying.

When he finally finished, he took a last fleeting glance at the carcass's slumped head before he pounced into the air again.

He continued to hunt in this manner until he felt he could eat no more, and he finished by washed his muzzle in a small pond to clean it of the dried blood. When it was finally clean, he roosted tiredly in a thickly-foliaged tree to rest, calmly looking out at the scene beneath him.

He loved how peaceful the jungle always seemed at this time of night. The moonlight bounced off of every frond and every vine; the bugs droned in subtle harmony; and most of all, he enjoyed roosting alone where he could enjoy the peace undisturbed, safe to relax without anyone else around to bother him.

As his luck would have it, however, a few other young Vampyrum were also out hunting near his tree. He cursed them under his breath as they circled around only a hundred wingbeats away, talking loudly. The group turned towards him slightly, and despite his quick shuffle to conceal himself behind a thick leaf, one of the other bats managed to spot him. He swore to himself again as the newcomer wasted no time in heading over, calling out behind her to the others as she approached.

"Hey Amis," the bat said as she landed, her voice ripe with forced enthusiasm. He suddenly found himself struggling to remember her name. _Livias_, he thought. _Yes, that's it, the wretched thing_.

In all honesty, Amis never talked much with the other Vampyrum his age. More often than not, he found that they simply liked to make up excuses to be in his presence. They only desired to have him near by as they carried out their private conversations; they would rarely, if ever, actually involve him directly: they just wanted to be seen with him—to appear like they were friends.

Sure enough, two other Vampyrum soon roosted next to Livias, much to Amis's dismay. One he recognized as Kakios—a vain and sadistic male, with unnerving misty eyes and a muzzle that was stuck in a perpetual snarl—and beside him, Amis was fairly certain that his other companion was Disma. She was a smaller, diminished-looking bat without any real feature that stood out. She possessed an incredibly amorphous personality, always mimicking the attitudes of those around her. This, however, was mostly out of necessity: she was shorter and weaker than the others, with beady, shifty eyes that hinted at her lack of social confidence. Really, her lack of confidence was the only definitive trait she held—well, other than the fact that she was a terrible thief. She had surprising ferocity for a bat her size, and she had managed to swindle quite a few of her peers out of their catches before.

Looking over his company, Amis could see the same false smile plastered over each of their faces. They were about as genuine as the sound-illusions many insects threw out to confuse hunters on their tail, though much less convincing. This was no new phenomenon to him, however, so it was that he proceeded to half-heartedly hand out stiff greetings to his fellow Vampyrum.

"Well, have you heard yet, Amis?" Kakios asked afterwards in his usual deep, proud tone while wrapping his wing dominantly around the female to his right. "Livias has agreed to be my mate."

_Of course she has_, he thought, _she doesn't have a death wish_.

"Congratulations," he heard himself saying unenthusiastically.

"I'm very happy for them," Disma said, turning to Amis and fixing him with a very pointed stare. He was surprised it didn't gouge his eyes out. "A lot of the others are choosing mates now, you know."

_I can see no one's chosen you yet_, he thought snidely, _What a surprise. Who would've thought that no bat in his right mind would want a thief as a mate?_ He held back his condescending remark, however, thinking it best to avoid directly antagonizing the others.

"Well, that _is_ why they call it mating season," he replied instead.

He figured he didn't need to play any games with Disma, knowing that she really couldn't care less how he felt about her. Indeed, as he had suspected, her expression was more of frustration than disappointment.

Again, this was not new to Amis. Disma, and a hoard of other females recently, had been dropping him hint after hint that they would like to mate with him—hints that were about as subtle as they were well-disguised. It was no mystery to Amis as to why so many girls were suddenly after him, as his mother had warned him about this very thing. Their interest was not so much a question of affection—most of the other Vampyrum found him boring and colossally uninteresting—no, they were more interested in him as an asset.

It was the same reason the other young Vampyrum were always seeking out his company, and it centered more on his status than his personality. He, after all, was the king's son, prince and heir to the throne. That alone granted him somewhat of a celebrity status in the jungle; but more than that even, his father was a living legend among the Vampyrum, and all of the newborns were told his amazing stories—stories the young bats were compelled to repeat over an over again, always with the same air of excited awe.

They were incredible enough stories, he had to admit. It was said, for example, that his father had clawed his way out of the Underworld itself to reclaim his throne, and twice escaped the imprisonment of the Humans. It wasn't terribly difficult to see the allure of such tales, but the stories weren't the issue so much as their side-effects. Amis felt fairly certain that his father's stories were the only reason anyone ever sought his company—without them, it was conceivable that no one would talk to him at all. However, this might have simply been wishful thinking on his part.

"Well, you should really get a move on," Disma continued, gouging him with her eyes once again and providing a rude reminder that she was still there, "soon there won't be anyone left."

"Hmm," he replied, non-committal and still entirely uninterested.

"Maybe you'd like to come hunting with me?" she offered transparently, feigning excitement at the idea. "I'm pretty good, you know."

"No thanks," he replied, unable to keep the frown of distaste from tugging at his mouth.

Not only had he already eaten, but he had also found that he truly despised Disma's company. In fact, he couldn't truthfully say that he had met another bat yet that he really got along with. Most of them were incredibly self-centered, and all they ever wanted to do was hunt, no matter how much they had eaten already—or tell stories, of course.

The younger ones were especially unbearable, though some of the elders seemed to be all right. That's why he usually spent most of his time haunting the royal pyramid where he could observe the priests and artisans at work. It was far more interesting than the gloating conversations Kakios was always trying to engage him in, anyway. Furthermore, his father demanded that he study with the high priest, Nikomedes, so that he may better serve his devotion to Zotz. Part of that duty included reading the Stone.

The sacred Stone, said to have been carved by the bat god himself, recorded the past and predicted the future—or at least, that is what he was always told. In reality, he could never bring himself to understand the nearly indistinguishable symbols that ran neatly along its edge. He preferred to the leave the laborious interpretations to the priest.

Despite his supreme disinterest, however, he was never permitted to forget that it was his destiny to continue the Vampyrum traditions when he eventually took the throne himself; and so, his father had spent every waking moment scrutinizing and criticizing his son to ensure that he was raised to the most stringent expectations. Ultimately, nothing was ever good enough for him, and Amis doubted than anything would be. It was to the extent that he had grown ever more distant from his heroic father, and even his mother strayed from ever extending him much affection. At any rate, his lack of friends was not exactly balanced by a supportive family.

Livias shivered suddenly, reminding Amis once again that his company had not yet grown bored of him.

"Why is it so cold?" she asked in explanation of her actions, sounding her usual irritable self. "You'd think we were in the northern forests or something."

"Don't be stupid," Disma said. "The northern forests are way colder than this. Goth almost froze to death when he was up there."

Goth. They were talking about his father again.

Of course they were, he thought. Who wouldn't want to talk about his heroic father, who had escaped from the Humans on two separate occasions? Who wouldn't excitedly relive the way Goth had broken free of the Underworld by cunningly tricking that stupid newborn into trusting him, only to steal his life? Who wouldn't want to be like his courageous father? Only one bat in the world, probably.

"No way!" Kakios said disdainfully, turning angrily to Disma. "Goth's no weakling! He wasn't going to let something petty like bad weather stop him from fulfilling Zotz's promises! He was going to sleep through the winter nice and warm in that naïve Silverwing's hibernation roost!"

"Mmm," Livias said distractedly. "Could you imagine all of those bats, just hanging there, waiting to be eaten one-by-one?"

"Yeah," Disma sighed longingly.

"I caught a northern bat yesterday, actually," Kakios said cockily.

"You did not!" Disma retorted in disbelief.

"I did," Kakios insisted. "A Graywing. He was really thin—must've gotten lost during migration or something," he added indifferently.

"You're so lucky," Livias breathed, staring at her mate in admiration. Maybe there was some bizarre kind of romance between them after all, Amis thought.

He was starting to feel uncomfortable at the turn in the conversation, and he figured he could probably leave now without anyone noticing—or caring for that matter. Sighing inwardly, he dropped discreetly from the branch and fell in silence for a while before unfurling his three-foot wings and soaring back towards the royal pyramid.

He had seen other Vampyrum catch the occasional northern bat now and then, all of which where usually lost and flying around confusedly. Every time he witnessed such a thing, he felt an odd pang inside him. He knew it was really no different than killing a bird or a rat, but something about the whole idea just seemed wrong to him. He couldn't quite describe what it was, though. Maybe it was because it was a fellow bat, maybe it was because it was small and lost and helpless, maybe he was just pathetic and weak for feeling any amount of pity for the small creatures, but whatever it the reason, Amis just couldn't come to terms with it.

As he approached the entrance to the temple that would eventually lead him to the sacrificial chamber, he could see his mother hanging above the passageway in wait for him. Her face was neutral, if somewhat disdainful, but Amis's attuned eyes could sense the grim aura surrounding her as it wafted through the forest like thick fog.


	4. Chapter 4: The Cycle

**Chapter 4: The Cycle**

The spire was just as Marina had remembered it. The warm air, the pungent smell of Zephyr's leaves and berries, the gentle and unified singing from the Humans far below…but like previous years, she found herself disappointed that she had to share it with such a large crowd. It was so noisy and uncomfortable with the entire colony around, and Zephyr was always so busy conversing with the elders that she could rarely get him to herself. It made her miss the few nights she had spent alone in the tower with Shade, when there had been no one else around to bother them.

As she watched the elders discuss winds and star positions with the old bat, Marina decided to go check on Griffin. He had a bad habit of letting his fears build up when no one is around to calm him down.

With a small sigh, she dropped quietly from her roost, fluttering her way over the thick wooden beams and metal struts that crisscrossed their way through the open spire. She suddenly found herself wondering, as she flew across the spire, whether she was being too protective of her son. After all, he had grown considerably since he was just a newborns—and not just physically either. Did he really need his mother checking on him all the time? Did he even _want_ her to check on him all the time? She was always so certain that he liked having her around a lot, but now she wondered if she was just seeing things the way she wanted to see them.

She supposed that she could stand to let Griffin be a little more independent. She thought of turning back right then, but then she thought of Shade and his impulsive ways. Everyone had seen where that had landed him, and she just couldn't risk letting her son go the same way.

She came back to her senses just as his dark outline carved itself against the spire's outer walls, his body illuminated somewhat by the bright swaths of fur amongst his shining silver. He had inherited those patches from her, she realized fondly.

She set down beside him and greeted him with a quick nuzzle. "So how are you holding up?" she asked.

"Fine, I guess," he replied, shrugging slightly. "For some reason I never worry very much when I'm here."

"That's good," she replied, and his calm demeanor made her wonder if _she _was the one worrying too much. They fell into the kind of silence that comes when two people have nothing new to say to each other. Finally, Marina took a quick glance around them and turned back to Griffin with a frown. "Where's Luna?"

"I think she's out hunting," he answered casually.

Her eyes narrowed suspiciously. "You didn't go with her?"

He shrugged again, "I wasn't really that hungry."

He looked away and Marina felt herself pausing suddenly. Her son seemed strangely different somehow. His voice seemed a little flatter than before, his eyes a little dimmer. Moreover, she had never known Griffin to pass up a hunting competition with Luna. The only time he ever acted like this was when he was tired, but even then he was generally fairly talkative.

She began to worry that something might be wrong. The only way she could describe her son's appearance was bored, but she had never know Griffin of all bats to be bored. He was always so content with everything; he never found anything too dull—dull was safe, after all. Yet still, there was no other word for it.

"Well," Marina offered, making up her mind finally, "I was going to go talk to Zephyr. If you're not doing anything, then why don't you come with me?"

"Come with you?" he asked hesitantly.

"Yeah, why not?"

"I dunno…"

He looked up at the small group of bats gathered high in the cathedral's tower, still talking casually. As he watched them, the usual look of uncertainty crept back onto his face, and Marina felt relieved to see him acting normally again. This was the Griffin she had always known.

"He looks kind of busy right now," her son said eventually. "What if he doesn't want more company?"

"I'm always ready to welcome more company."

The two bats looked up to see Zephyr's staring down benevolently from above, and Marina grinned impulsively: somehow, she always managed to forget just how good the old bat's hearing was.

"Well, come on Griffin!" she said happily as she leapt from her roost and started a steady spiral up through the sturdy rafters.

Marian half expected her son to stay behind. Every year he had asked the old bat the same question, and yet he had never quite acclimatized to Zephyr's murky eyes. Sure enough, though, she grinned down encouragingly when Griffin launched himself into the air after her, and she slowed a little to let him catch up.

"Gotten over your fear?" she asked jokingly.

"Nope," he replied with a smile, "afraid but doing it anyway."

She smiled sadly at his quote and they climbed the rest of the way in silence. As they rose through the spire together, Marina couldn't keep herself from flapping a little faster. She was excited to finally talk to Zephyr again after a long year—it was probably the highlight of the migration for her. Time after time, he always had something interesting to say, and he just knew so much. Even his cataract-leaden gaze had a soft, comforting quality to it.

"I hope we're not interrupting anything," Marina apologized as they leveled out beside Ariel and the others.

"No, no," Zephyr answered cheerfully. "It's always good to see an old friend. Besides, I think we were just about finished."

Lucretia nodded graciously, "Thank you for speaking with us again."

"A pleasure, as always," Zephyr replied. "Sleep well now."

With that, the elders took their leave, lighting from the rafter and descending towards their roosts below.

Ariel smiled warmly to Marina before following the others towards their special elevated roost, where they could overlook the rest of the colony as it slept. Marina flicked her wingtip in acknowledgement, and as the elder descended out of sight, she finally set down beside the old bat, not entirely sure where to start.

"It's been too long, Zephyr," she greeted, suddenly feeling oddly formal.

"On the contrary, my dear Marina," he disagreed brightly. "I feel that it's been just long enough."

Marina frowned for a moment in reply, not quite sure what the old bat meant. She simply stared back at him puzzlingly, waiting patiently for an explanation. After all, Zephyr had a habit of being mysterious, as she knew all too well. A few moments passed before Zephyr finally did open his mouth, but when he spoke, it wasn't Marina that he addressed.

"Come settle down, young one," he said welcomingly, his ears swiveling in the direction of Griffin, who had been circling in the air uncertainly the whole time. "Surely I haven't grown any more frightening in the year since we last met," he joked.

With an uncomfortable laugh, Griffin settled down next to his mother, shifting his claws around awkwardly. In an instant he had reverted from the mature, grown-up bat who had saved Luna from the Underworld to the frightened newborn that had eaten caterpillars all day. He was looking over at her now as though asking her permission to continue.

"Go ahead," Marina said, chuckling inside at his sudden timidity.

"Uh, Zephyr?" he began uncertainly. "Are we going to make it to Hibernaculum safely again?"

He finally looked up at the albino warily, appearing very on-edge as he awaited the answer. Unlike before, however, when the old bat had simply chuckled warmly and assured him that their journey would be smooth, Zephyr simply rested his cloudy eyes on the young Silverwing as though thinking carefully. It was like he was scrutinizing him, sizing him up even—but against what exactly, Marina wasn't sure.

"I can see you've grown, Griffin," Zephyr evaded finally. "Your voice no longer has that same air of worry or fear to it—an admirable improvement in your character, no doubt. It's good to know that you've become more confident in yourself; perhaps you will soon be able to cope with the unknown, to balance fear and preparedness—hopefully long before I'm gone."

Griffin smiled uncomfortably at the albino's praise, though he seemed more confused than flattered. It was irrelevant, however, as Zephyr wasn't finished.

"You are wise to ask me these questions—it is always sensible to use all resources at your disposal, and none can truly say they would pass up the opportunity to know what lies ahead. However," he finished darkly, "I cannot answer your question this time."

With the keeper's last few words, the calm, almost bored expression left Griffin's face at an alarming pace, quickly replaced by an anxious frown. By this point, that look seemed all to natural to Marina.

However, she too found herself caught thoroughly off-guard by the sincerity of Zephyr's tone. She figured that the wise bat was just trying to teach her son an important lesson about accepting risks as an inevitable part of life, but she couldn't help feeling a small tremble beneath her fur.

After pausing to allow the two bats to consider his words for a moment, Zephyr heaved a sad sigh and continued. "I'm afraid you will not be going to Hibernaculum this year—now, just listen for a moment," he insisted as Griffin made an audible protest. He turned to Marina.

"Marina, I have never been fully honest with you these past few years—possibly because I grew to care for you and Shade far more than I should have—but time is short now, and you must listen carefully."

The seriousness in her old friend's voice made her stomach clench slightly in trepidation, and she suddenly caught herself feeling Griffin's anxiety infect her. Zephyr wasn't one to joke like this.

Looking over at Griffin, she saw her own mild stirrings amplified ten times over in his eyes. He looked positively terrified that his simple question had yielded such an ominous answer, and she began to grow concerned for him.

"Maybe Griffin should leave," she said hesitantly, sensing the same grim premonition from before spread its way through her body.

Zephyr considered this for a while, looking as though he were about to protest. "He will need to know eventually," he began slowly.

He stared into Griffin's eyes, almost as though searching for something with his sightless orbs. After quite some time, Marina thought she saw his face soften slightly—though his voice seemed to sadden further.

"I suppose he can wait to hear it from you," Zephyr conceded finally, but his ears drooped slightly as though ashamed of himself. "In the mean time, perhaps it is best that you get some rest, Griffin."

The albino nodded, kindly dismissing him. Shockingly, Griffin looked almost as though he were about to argue for a moment, to say that he wished to stay behind, but then, the moment had passed. He gave his mother a fleeting nuzzle before dutifully leaving for his roost far below, where Luna was already waiting for him.

"You have a fascination son, Marina," Zephyr began conversationally. "I sense a lot of his father in him."

"He doesn't think so," Marina admitted dejectedly.

"He just hasn't had much chance to prove it to himself yet," he assured her with a wise smile. "Have he and Luna talked much about having a child?"

Marina laughed. "Not Griffin," she said. "He gets worried way too easily to…" She paused suddenly and looked over at Zephyr. "How did you know Griffin and Luna were mates?"

Zephyr chuckled. "Not much escapes these ears of mine."

Marina nodded, remembering all too well. The two of them fell into another long pause.

"I'm sorry," she said finally, "but you said something about not going to Hibernaculum?"

It took quite an effort to force herself to prompt him, for she wasn't sure that she really wanted to hear what Zephyr had to say, but she could still feel the strange tingling in her skin.

"Ah, yes. You must forgive my musings," the albino beseeched her. "With a great age comes a great deal of attachment to the smaller things in life. However, I feel that we must now turn our attention to the larger issues at hand."

With an almost dramatic pause, he fixed his sightless eyes on Marina as his voice grew somber. "It pains me to say this, Marina, but Goth is alive once more."

"I know," she said with a nod, feeling relieved that this was all he had waned to say. "Griffin told me when he came back from the Underworld."

"Of course he did," Zephyr agreed, smiling quickly. "However, what you may not know is that he has already begun collecting prisoners again. Goth is not wasting any time now that he has been awarded a second chance at success. Zotz is already growing stronger through his regular sacrifices, and the next partial eclipse is approaching quickly."

Marina realized that she had been holding her breath, and she finally let it out slowly. Of course Goth would try to kill the sun again; she should have already known that. She should already be doing something about it—Shade would've left for the jungle the second he had known.

With stunning clarity, the memories of their last visit to the jungle came tumbling back to her, and a sort of tired anxiety began to fall over her. She though of everything they had suffered at the hands of the Vampyrum that year, all of them—the owls, the bats, the rats. Now, it was happening all over again, and it could only mean more bloodshed, more lost lives to join her mate. Then, with a different kind of fear, she though of Griffin and Luna—not newborns at any rate but still so young in her eyes—and Shade wasn't around to save the day for them this time.

_Zotz's strength is growing_.

"How do you know this?" she found herself asking desperately, almost as if to convince herself that this wasn't really happening. "How can you be sure that Zotz is getting stronger?"

"He is starting to show his presence in the world of the living," Zephyr said simply.

"He can come into the Upper World now?" Marina asked in shock.

Zephyr shook his head. "Thankfully, he is not strong enough to appear in his full form," he explained. "Only the complete destruction of the sun would allow that. But he does have enough power to posses small, inanimate objects, and only for the briefest of times. Still, he can use this power to spy, to interfere—in fact, he could be listening to us right now as we speak."

Marina's fur stood on end. "Right now?" She imagined the Vampyrum god hiding inside the wooden rafters, watching them with those unblinking eyes, listening on as they plotted against him.

"Alas, I don't expect we are of any immediate interest to him," Zephyr assured her. "He is too self-centered for that. He prefers to use his newfound power to further strengthen himself."

"How can he do that?"

"It's fearfully simple. Those thing which he can inhabit are limited in strength, not in size. A plant, for example, is hardly difficult to possess, and he can use their vines to drag his own sacrifices into the Underworld. Fortunately, he cannot attack anything too large—it hurts him to come into contact with the living—but small animals, like rodents, bird hatchlings, or even the young of larger beasts are all susceptible to attack."

The whole time, Marina felt her spirits dropping. She shook her head and stared down at her claws, picturing an unsuspecting rat getting dragged away into the Underworld and falling to its death. It was far too much for her to take in at once, the thought of this malevolent god growing stronger and stronger in this way. If he was strong enough to actually reach into the world of the living and drag weak, innocent victims to their doom, what chance did she have against him? She was just one bat!

She hated to admit it—and she never would've let him know had he still been alive—but she was lost without her mate. Shade always had a way of dealing with tough situations like this at the last second, always discovering some brilliant solution. He was impulsive, and never thought things through, and half of his success was probably luck…but he always came to the rescue in the end. It was impossible for her to think of continuing his saga alone now.

"So what can we do?" she made herself asked eventually, refusing to let her hopelessness close in on her.

Zephyr smiled at her. It was a weak smile, but also a fond one, and it gave her some comfort. "I know it is a lot to take in at once," he soothed gently, "but all is not lost. Zotz cannot feasibly sustain himself without the sacrifices of the Vampyrum Spectrum. If we can stop them before the eclipse, his strength will fade, and the world will be safe again."

"But how?" she asked. "Shade's gone now, and I have to watch out for Griffin! We lost so many bats and owls and rats last time—and they weren't even expecting us then! How—?"

"Shh," Zephyr whispered, putting a claw on her shoulder to calm her down. "You never give yourself enough credit Marina, hanging back in Shade's shadow. You are a very intelligent bat, and you played no small part in the last assault on the Vampyrum pyramid. You're more than capable of doing this, and you know it. You've raised Griffin well, and I'm confident that he can survive on his own—at any rate, he'll be coming with you."

"What? But he can't! He—"

Marina tried to protest, not wanting to put Griffin in harm's way, but Zephyr cut her off gently.

"Just listen, Marina—there is no need for you to mimic Shade's impatience," he told her with a smile. "I will be speaking to Ariel about this once we are finished here, but you deserve to know first."

His face saddened again. "It is inevitable that an army will march against the great pyramids in the south—it is terrible for me to say, for I know the losses will be great, but it is crucial to every living soul on this earth that Zotz stay imprisoned in the Underworld."

"But there's no way we could take on the Vampyrum by ourselves!" Marina exclaimed, venting her frustration. It was a terrible time for her to finally understand how Shade felt back at Statue Haven. "It'd be suicide! The bats would be willing enough to help—maybe even the owls—but we'd never be able to kill them all! There are thousands, maybe even millions of them, and as long as enough of them survive to keep breeding, the cycle will never end!"

"That is where you are wrong, Marina," Zephyr continued sagely. "There is a big change coming—one that, with luck, will break the tyrannical cycle once and for all. But that is none of your concern, nor is the rallying of birds and bats for the cause. Ariel and the rest of your colony will head to Bridge City to gather forces there—though for their own sake, they must be quick about it," he added parenthetically. He continued again without explanation. "No, you must fulfill an important task elsewhere. You were right to say that the bats and owls would not be enough—not even if they enlisted the other birds, or the rats would you stand a fair chance. Therefore, you must travel east to intercept the migrating wolf packs as they pass through the mountains. They will play a crucial role in our success."

"The wolves?" Marina asked apprehensively. Why would the wolves help the bats? They were the most feared beasts in the northern forests—they didn't need any other creature, least of all the bats.

"I know you find this difficult to believe," Zephyr pressed on, "and I know this is all happening quickly, but you must trust me, Marina. The wolves may be strong, but their young are not. Many cubs have already fallen prey to Zotz new powers, and many more will follow if he is not stopped. You will go and speak to the wolf leaders—ask them for support. You may be surprised by how willing an audience they are."

Marina gave a doubtful grunt.

"The fate of our entire world, as we know it, hangs in the balance," Zephyr said seriously. "Remember, Marina: you've seen first hand that strong allies can come from the most unlikely of places."

This hardly made Marina feel any more confident, but she knew that Zephyr was growing impatient and that her contention wasn't helping.

"Now," he began once more, this time on a slightly happier note, "you must go speak to Griffin while I brief Ariel on the change in plans—no doubt your son will want to know where you're going. Also, I suggest that you take someone with you on your journey. After all, it is far to easy to get lost in a winter storm, is it not?" he finished with a smile.

Despite everything that had just been laid on her shoulders—indeed, on all their shoulders—Marina couldn't help but smile back at the old bat. There was something immeasurable comforting about his cloudy eyes and bright white body, and she found her mind already beginning to believe him. Dealing with wolves, rallying an army, returning to the jungle, fighting Goth, fighting Zotz…her head was swirling with everything she had been told, but she forced herself to stay focused.

Distractedly, something in her mind demanded to know why these things always seemed to happen to her, but she knew that, somewhere, Shade was there watching over her right now, and she felt that it was finally her turn to be the hero. She looked down at the roosting bats below and sighed.

"This colony's already been through so much," she found herself saying resignedly. "I just wonder what chance we stand of making it through this whole thing alive."

"You mustn't worry," Zephyr comforted her. "You'll do a fine job enlisting the help of the wolves—I can hear into the future, remember?"

Marina laughed slightly, before falling into another short stretch of silence. "I only wish Shade were still here. Whenever he went jumping into something without thinking, it made me feel a lot more sure of myself."

"I miss him too," Zephyr agreed, with a surprising amount of sincerity. "But take heart, Marina, he's not been lost for ever. You'll see him again soon enough."

Marina looked over at her friend strangely. What did he mean by that last sentence? Surely there was no way that Shade could be brought back to life?

"How—?"

"I think I see Ariel coming," Zephyr interrupted, with a bit of a mischievous glint in his eye. "You'd better go talk to Griffin."

Marina wanted to stay, wanted to force Zephyr to tell her what his last few words had meant, but she knew better than to argue with the wise bat. She gave him final smile before dropping from the roost, flicking her wing in greeting to Ariel as she passed lower into the spire.

So much had changed in far too short a time, and she marveled at just how much she had suffered through in her short life. It was a miracle that her mind hadn't snapped under the strain. Still, despite all of the worries clawing for attention at the back of her mind, she couldn't keep herself from dwelling excitedly over one particular thought:

Zephyr had said that she would see Shade again.

* * *

><p>"You're leaving!" Griffin exclaimed in disbelief.<p>

"Shh," Marina whispered patiently. "You'll wake Luna."

"I don't want to go to Bridge City by myself!"

"Don't be silly Griffin," she said soothingly. "Your grandparents will both be there, and Luna will be around to keep you company. I'll only be gone for a couple of nights."

"Exactly two?" he asked doggedly.

She sighed in exasperation. "Two, maybe three," she answered honestly. "But you have your own responsibilities. You need to help Ariel convince the other colonies to come south with us."

"But I don't want to go south," Griffin said anxiously. "I don't want to go anywhere near the Vampyrum Spectrum—especially Goth!"

"I know it's hard Griffin; no one wants this. But we need to stop Zotz—you remember better than anyone what he can do."

Her son seemed to be ready to argue more, but Marina was surprised when he took a deep, calming breath. "I know, mom. I just worry sometimes."

She laughed affectionately. "You worry too much sometimes, Griffin."

They roosted in silence for a while before she spoke again. "I'm afraid too," she admitted. "Everyone is."

"I just want you to be careful," he pleaded. "I can't lose you too."

"I'll be fine, Griffin, I promise; but you need to take care of yourself this time—you need to take care of Luna."

He nodded responsibly, and Marina wondered if he was truly ready to travel without her checking on him all the time. Perhaps it was for the better.

"Ariel will make the announcement tomorrow that you're heading to Bridge City," she said finally. "Chinook's going to tag along with me, so I won't be by myself. All I want you and Luna to do is look out for each other. And remember Griffin," she finished with a loving nuzzle, "You promised me you wouldn't die again."

He gave a slightly choked chuckle and pressed back against her. "I won't."

Marina gave him one last, fleeting smile before heading off to find Chinook, who was saying goodbye to his own mate and son.

"It feels kind of strange, doesn't it?" he asked as he flew over to join her and they made their way through the gargoyle's throat together. "Doing this all over again without Shade?"

"Yeah," Marina agreed, nudging him with her wingtip as the soared out into the city sky, "but it gives us a chance to show him up this time."

Chinook laughed genuinely. "I've never been very successful at overshadowing him," he said with cheery honesty, and Marina felt her nervousness wash away slightly as she talked with Chinook. At least she would be in good company.

Having unanimously decided not to wait until nightfall, the full glare of the sun illuminated the two bats as they made their way across the sprawling city, the light silhouetting the dark mountains in the distance. It was there that they would meet the wolves, and it was there that everything would begin.

* * *

><p>Zephyr mumbled to himself slightly as the sound of Marina and Chinook's flapping grew fainter and fainter, bravely making their way towards the wolf-inhabited mountains to the east. With Nocturna watching over them, the old bat knew that they would be safe, and so he focused his ears on the future of the rest of the colony.<p>

The distant echoes began to form wavy, silver images in his head, and it was with some relief that traces of sound yet to come told of their safe arrival, and even hinted at the success of their negotiations there. _But just how soon will they arrive? _he wondered to himself, _and just how successful will they be?_

Unable to make the picture in his head any clearer, his thoughts came drifting inadvertently back to Marina, and how he had failed to fully disclose with her all that he had seen. Truly, he had grown far too attached to the Brightwing, sparing her the truth of her son's fate. He tried to convince himself that it was best, knowing that she would hardly believe him. After all, she seemed doubtful of her own fate even, not quite trusting that she would really be reunited with her lost mate. However, with unusual clarity for such a thing, Zephyr knew that their reunion was as sure as the tide.

Forcibly directing his mind back towards Bridge City and the ever-escalating tension that surrounded it, lost in a haze of echoes, he caught himself wishing that he were mistaken more often.


	5. Chapter 5: Departure

**Chapter 5: Departure**

Back into the cold night air, Griffin found himself sorely missing the warmth and comfort of the spire. The wind berated him ceaselessly, slicing through even his thick fur and chilling every bone in his body. Soon, the sound of his chattering teeth were added to the hundreds of others filling the air around him, the entire colony freezing as it pressed westward towards Bridge City. Despite the cold, their determination acted as a stronger tailwind than any even Nocturna could have swept up.

Of course, he was worried again, but this time he felt that he had a good reason to be. Heading to the jungle again was bound to spell death for far too many of the bats traveling with him now, just as it had all those years earlier. He might not have been around when the Vampyrum had made their first attempt at killing the sun, but he had heard frightening stories—stories of bats having their hearts torn from their chests and watching, still alive, as Goth devoured it before their eyes.

At this, he caught himself casting an anxious glance over at Luna beside him. He had lost her once already; if he lost her this time, there would be no more second chances.

He had considered telling her to stay behind, to go to Hibernaculum where she would be safe, but he knew it was pointless. She would never pass up something so adventurous as this—or something so dangerous. Then again, what difference did it make, really? If Zotz did rise into the Upper World, they'd all be doomed anyway. It was more a matter of choosing which death was preferable.

Given the risks involved, it was surprising just how eager the colony was to fight for the sun again, even after everything they had already been through. Ariel had briefed them at all dusk, and she had been careful to stress the danger of their mission. Anyone who felt anxious was free to continue on to Hibernaculum if they chose—no one was forced to come along. It had taken Griffin all of his courage to stay rooted to the spot as he looked around at the rest of the colony. He had no desire to go himself, but he had no choice. It was personal: Goth had killed his father. Furthermore, he knew Luna would want to help and, though he doubted he was of much use in a fight, he couldn't stand the thought of letting her go alone.

It seemed they would be far from traveling alone, however, as not a single bat in the entire spire had faltered or spoken up. They had all remained behind, determined to risk their lives for the world once again. In all honesty, they were probably getting used to mortal peril by now.

In the end, the male elders—too old to fight anyways—had insisted upon escorting the newborns along the rest of the migration route while their parents traveled to Bridge City. Despite their vehement protests, they were too young to be of any help, and their parents ultimately set them on their way with a short, fleeting nuzzle. Griffin could remember feeling a small clench in his stomach, knowing that, for many of them, it would be the last they would ever see of their parents.

A vicious gust of wind cut into him suddenly, and he was jerked from his grim thoughts for a moment. He had started to develop a strange sense of gratitude towards the cold, for the constant shivering kept him distracted just enough to prevent his fears from overwhelming him. As the remaining colony flew on resolutely through the cold night air, he began to wonder just how long a flight it was to the legendary Bridge City.

His mother had told him once that the vast bridge was home to millions upon millions of bats, hailing from every corner of the northern forests. Silverwings, Brightwings, Graywings…and other kinds of bat he had only ever heard of. Then there were the famous elders that had popped up from time to in the stories the newborns always told—though they were generally only mentioned in the course of one of Shade's long tales. If they hadn't been on their way to mortal peril, and if Griffin hadn't known better, he might've felt excited.

"Looks like we're finally going to have an adventure again, huh Griff?" Luna said suddenly, wrenching him from his thoughts as she winked over at him brightly.

Of course it would all be just a thrilling adventure to her—same old Luna. It seemed impossible for anything to get her down, and her mood was contagious as he found himself smiling back at her. "Be careful what you wish for."

* * *

><p>"How long have we been flying?" Chinook asked lightly, shaking his fur a little.<p>

Marina didn't answer. They had left the spire almost a full day ago, never once stopping to rest or hunt, and she planned to keep going until she couldn't beat her wings any longer. She was too determined to get back to Griffin to even consider stopping, and they had traveled in silence most of the way, conserving their breath as they fought stubbornly against a blistering headwind. She could only hope that they would find the wolves before they fell from the sky.

"Those mountains don't seem any closer," he commented again, inclining his head slightly. "How far do you think they are?"

Marina shrugged in response, squinting at the massive peaks of black rock jutting into the sky ahead of them. "Maybe a million wingbeats. Depends on how long this wind holds out."

Chinook grunted. "Do you think we should rest?"

She shook her head. She was desperately tired, and hungry, but they simply didn't have the time. With each passing minute, she thought of Griffin, heading off to Bridge City without her, and she forced herself to ignore her fatigue.

For a while they said nothing more, focusing all their efforts on willing the mountains to draw closer. Marina just kept beating her wings, and as her aching wings and empty stomach screamed in protest, she remembered how Shade had mistaken the twin peaks on his sound map for wolf ears, all that time ago. With a quick smile, the memory gave her the strength to push on through the cold winds. Sore wings were no excuse.

"Do you think Zephyr was right?" Chinook asked suddenly, breaking through the shrieking wind.

"Right about what?" Marina said mildly, her mind elsewhere.

"Do you think the wolves will be willing to help us? They're not supposed to be very friendly."

"I trust Zephyr," she said mechanically. She could handle the cold and the fatigue and the hunger, but doubts would simply make the whole ordeal unbearable.

"Besides," she added when Chinook gave her a skeptical look, "that's why I have a big strong bat coming along to protect me."

He grinned back at her. "I think I should warn you: I'm a terrible coward. I'm pretty much useless in an emergency."

"That's not what I heard," she said kindly. "Shade told me you saved his life."

"Completely by accident, though," he continued with a laugh. "I just panicked."

"Well, you can do some pretty amazing things when you panic, it seems."

He shook his head stubbornly. "To be honest, it'll more likely be you protecting me."

"Hmm. That _is_ the way it always seemed with Shade," she agreed readily. "But how can I be expected to make the right decisions without someone else along to make the wrong ones?"

At that, Chinook laughed. "So I'm a replacement for Shade's lack of foresight?"

"You could say that," she replied with a smirk. "I'm afraid you're not doing a good enough job of it, though. Shade was always much whinier."

With that, they both broke out into gales laughter, and suddenly things seemed immeasurably better. She supposed she shouldn't really be speaking ill of her deceased mate, for she wasn't really sure that such a thing was appropriate; but his impulsiveness was just one of those things that had always made him Shade, equally as much as his loyalty and his bravery.

"I'm sort of glad that this is happening," Chinook admitted after he had caught his breath. "Things were almost getting too peaceful without him around."

Marina nodded, looking over at him. To her surprise, he wasn't smiling any more; his eyes seemed to glisten as though he were crying, but the wind just wouldn't let his tears break free. She knew that Chinook had always admired Shade, but she never thought he felt so strongly about him.

"Sorry," Chinook said, catching her gaze and sniffling a little. "It's hard not to miss the little runt."

"I know," Marina sighed, "I know."

* * *

><p>Griffin had lost track of how long he'd been flying; all he knew was that his chest was terribly sore from beating his wings, and his eyes simply refused to stay open for more than a few seconds at a time. He forced his drooping gaze over at Luna, wondering how she was holding up.<p>

"Tired?" he asked.

She shook her head firmly. "I've been on longer journeys than this."

"Yeah," Griffin chuckled, remembering their exhausting voyage to the Tree, "but you were dead then."

"Exactly," Luna agreed breezily. "So now that I'm alive, I don't have any excuse to slow you down."

Griffin smiled and shook his head resignedly. Her wings could fall off her body and she wouldn't complain. That suited him perfectly, for he was more than capable of worrying enough for both of them.

"Aren't you at least a little excited?" she asked disappointedly after a short pause. "You're finally going to have a chance to get back at Goth!"

"Yeah," Griffin said grimly, "But _he's_ also going to have chance to get back at _me_."

"Well," she offered jokingly, "things didn't work out too well for him the last time he crossed paths with the mighty Griffin, did they?"

He laughed. "But that was all luck!"

"Better to be lucky than unlucky," she reminded him. "Really, you don't need to worry so much, Griff. When it comes down to it, you're just as brave as your father."

He smiled and felt his cheeks burn with the compliment. "You're not so bad yourself, you know," he returned. "Although, you seem to prefer finding ways of getting _yourself_ killed over other bats."

"You would know all about getting other bats killed, wouldn't you?" she asked teasingly.

His eyes snapped over to her fearfully, waking him up, but she was smiling. "It's okay, Griffin; I'm only joking."

"I still wish you would stop bringing that up," he muttered. "Can we change the subject?"

"Alright," Luna said darkly. "Do you want to discuss some newborn names?"

He sighed regretfully, but was too tired to shoot her another worried glance. Of course she would bring this up again; it seemed to be practically the only thing she ever thought about.

"Come on, Griff," Luna moaned in exasperation. "It's cute when you worry like this, but we've been mates for a long time now. I'm starting to think you're afraid of me or something."

"Well, I have good reason to be…" he started, trying to joke his way out without angering her. It didn't work.

"I'm serious!" she scolded. "You can't run away from this forever."

"I'm not running away," he denied childishly. "I'm just not ready for it. Besides, is this really the time? We could be dead in the next three or four nights!"

"All the more reason to talk about it now!" she persisted.

Griffin was about to argue back, but stopped quickly as Cassiel pulled up beside him.

He had never really known much about his grandfather, except that he had been banded by the Humans a long time ago—before Shade had even been born. Griffin had talked to him a couple of times at Stone Hold, but they weren't exactly on close speaking terms. What little he did know about the old bat was mostly from the stories of his father, who had set out to rescue Cassiel from the Humans when he was only a newborn. Not only had he succeeded, but he had also practically immortalized himself by saving the sun and returning the bats to the light of day.

"How are you two holding out?" Cassiel asked, sounding exactly like his mother.

"Oh, Griffin's being his usual worrisome self," Luna said, although with a hint of annoyance this time. "Apparently he's dead afraid of having—"

"—We're fine," Griffin said, cutting her off before she said anything embarrassing. Luna scowled and braked slightly, pulling back away from them.

"What's the matter with her?" Cassiel asked with a concerned frown.

Griffin sighed. "It's…complicated."

"Ah, I see," he answered, a knowing glint in his eye. "You know, your father was the same way for a time."

"I don't know what you mean," Griffin evaded.

"He was unsure of himself, just as you are," Cassiel explained.

Griffin considered playing dumb some more, but couldn't see what good it would do. He had never been a good liar—he always worried too much to lie successfully.

"It all just seems too fast," he heard himself blurt out suddenly.

"I know," Cassiel soothed. "But you'll feel differently in time—everyone always does."

"How long do you think she'll be mad at me?" he said miserably, looking over his wing at her as she talked to her friend, Skye.

"Not long," Cassiel assured him. "She really does love you, Griffin, you just have two very different ways of showing it. It's the same way your parents were."

Griffin nodded grimly, suddenly reminded of his mother, flying off away from him in the opposite direction. He missed her even more than he missed the warmth of the spire, and he almost felt like he was back at Stone Hold again, all by himself. Sure, Chinook and Cassiel were there always, but most of the bats his age were only rough acquaintances of his, and all they ever wanted to do was sleep. That was why he actually looked forward to migrating—at least, until they actually set out and his worrisome mind jumped back into gear.

Now, with Luna no longer by his side and his mother gone, the same loneliness was creeping in on him again. He began to wonder anxiously whether Marina had found the wolves—to fear that she had found the wolves.

"Your mother will be fine," Cassiel said, reading the look on his face. "Marina's a smart bat. She can get through anything."

He smiled over at his reassuringly and Griffin returned it weakly. He wanted to believe the old bat, but he had felt the same way about his father before he had been taken from him forever. If Shade was vulnerable, who wasn't?

An awkward sort of silence fell over the two bats suddenly, and Griffin couldn't help but wonder if his grandfather was thinking the same thing he was.

"You'd better go find Luna," Cassiel said eventually. "Lucretia said we should be arriving at Bridge City soon."

With that, the old bat pulled away, leaving Griffin alone to his thoughts. Maybe he really was being unreasonable with Luna. He worried about so many things that it was hard for him to decipher which were worthy of attention and which were just childish fears, as much as he tried to sort through them. He had hoped that it would become easier with time, easier with experience, but he found that he was beginning to doubt that he would ever stop worrying about everything. _Great_, he thought resentfully, _now I'm worrying about worrying_.

He lifted his head, instinctively taking his bearings again as the landscape changed drastically before him. Above the flattening ground below, he felt the pit in his stomach grow, nearly immobilizing him.

Now that he was finally here, it was with a terrible premonition that he beheld the scene before him, as though he were flying towards something seemingly innocent but secretly very dangerous. It took him a great deal of effort to keep resolutely beating his wings, soaring on against his better judgement, and as the foggy, blurred outline of Bridge City gradually became more defined, he could spot the rolling mass of bats churning along the great bridge's underside. Though it did little to quench his fears, he took some comfort in the knowledge that they would at least be in great numbers as they traveled south to the Vampyrum.


	6. Chapter 6: Negotiations

**Chapter 6: Negotiations**

"Maybe we should roost for the day," Chinook suggested as the sun broke free from the horizon, washing the rocky terrain below in its bright light.

"Zephyr said we don't have much time," she reminded him. Then, more optimistically, "We must be close now."

The ground had steadily become rougher and less defined, rising gradually towards them. Already as she looked back over her wing, Marina could see that the Human city was nestled far below them, its distant lights combining into one pulsing blur. They were truly in the mountains now, and it wouldn't be long before they found wolves.

However, she was beginning to sincerely regret her refusal to take a break. She felt that if they didn't intercept the wolves soon her wings would fall off from the strain. Her eyes didn't feel any better either, constantly drooping down against her will, and she was grateful that her fatigue hadn't affected her echo-vision.

She glanced casually over at Chinook beside her to see how he was faring, watching his strong wings beat impressively. Despite the years that had passed since she had first met him, he had grown, if anything, more handsome with age. His face had become more refined, his chest more muscular—and beyond that he seemed much wiser, his eyes gleaming with a strange intelligence that had certainly not been there before. Something had changed in him, that was for sure.

Realizing suddenly that she was staring, Marina guiltily turned her gaze away from her companion; but she could swear, in her mind's eye, that Chinook had turned to look over at her as well.

"You know Marina," he began suddenly, "I—"

He broke off, and she looked over at him curiously.

"What is it?"

He pointed at the ground with his claw, but even before she could follow his gaze, the smell reached her—the smell of sheer power.

There, walking across the snow-covered mountain was a single, lone wolf; and even from her lofty altitude, Marina felt a small tremor of fear looking down at the intimidating beast below. It was hard not to feel some misgivings about her task: the wolves were the biggest, strongest, and fiercest animals in all the northern forests.

_Except the Humans_, she corrected as an afterthought.

"Should we go talk to it?" Chinook asked.

"No," Marina said readily. "We'll follow it. It'll lead us to the rest of its pack."

She trimmed her wings to descend and Chinook to giver her a quizzical look. "What are you doing?"

"I'm going lower," she explained.

"Are you crazy?" Chinook whispered urgently, as though the wolf could hear them.

"I don't want to lose sight of it," she said. "Besides, it's too cold up here."

She lowered her head into the wind, and as she began to sink below him, Chinook seemed to be struggling with himself. When he reluctantly angled his wings and dropped down beside her again, he looked a little frightened. Perhaps he had been telling the truth about being a coward.

Indeed, Marina had been surprised more than once by Chinook. He was so much bigger and so much stronger than Shade, and yet he had only a fraction of the courage. Then again, few bats had as much courage as Shade.

They followed the wolf in vigilant silence for while, watching curiously as it was eventually joined by another beast, and then another. As they flew on overhead, the group swelled alarmingly until it was distinctly larger than any one pack could possibly be.

"Why are there so many of them?" Marina wondered aloud.

"I don't know," Chinook answered, "but I don't like it."

The pack continued to grow at a terrible pace, starting to number in the hundreds. They walked with such purpose and intent that it was incredibly unnerving. Marina could think of no explanation for it; it was unheard of for wolves to collect together like this—they generally stuck to much smaller groups, or else set out on their own.

Finally, after about an hour of this strange phenomenon, the fearsome mass of wolves gathered together in a rough circle, stopping high atop the mountain's snow covered peak. It was discomfortingly organized, as though each knew exactly where to stand and how to act. Then, as Marina and Chinook looked on from the air, one of the group's number strode out into the centre importantly, looking out among the expectant faces encircling him. He began to speak to his audience in a strange, barking language that Marina couldn't understand, and the purpose of the spectacle suddenly dawned on her.

"They're having a meeting," she breathed, dumbstruck by the sheer mass of wolves that had so systematically assembled in this one spot.

"I wonder what they're saying," Chinook whispered.

"Only one way to find out," Marina replied grimly.

She hesitated for only a moment to gather her strength, thinking of all the times Shade had rushed into a situation. With a deep breath, she stole herself before diving down towards the lone wolf, aiming to land in the very center of the circle. If it could work for him, she convinced herself, it could work for her. However, she found her heart racing anxiously anyway as she set down in front of the speaker, bravely flaring her wings for attention.

The effect of her actions did nothing to help her confidence. The wolf went silent very suddenly as he caught her in his peripheral vision, and she could hear shocked whispers trickle through the crowd around her. She forced herself to keep her eyes focused on the ground as the group's collective gaze fell on her small form—she could almost feel their eyes on her. All too quickly she began to have doubts, wondering if she had made a mistake in being so rash. Now that she was closer, she had an opportunity to take in the wolf's full appearance, and it only furthered her misgivings.

The first thing that drew her eyes were the tall, pointed ears, swiveling atop his head like miniature mountain peaks. Then there was his face, with a long muzzle that, had it not been covered in thick fur, would've borne an uncanny resemblance to Goth's flared nose. The teeth it housed however were far more terrifying than any Vampyrum's, sharp enough to snap bone. His eyes were large and dark, cloudy like a very deep pond, and she could see that the left one had a wide scar running across it so that with each blink the terrible gash was completed in its entirety. Still, none of this could compare to his sheer, towering size of the beast, hundreds of times her own.

Sweating slightly as she examined the wolf before her, Marina wondered if she had been too bold in rushing in so quickly, but she couldn't turn back now.

"I'm…I'm sorry to interrupt you," she began, faltering slightly at the wolf's daunting glare. "I'm Marina Brightwing, and…"

She suddenly wished she had taken agreed to do some hunting before speaking to the wolves; her empty stomach began to clench sickeningly as she looked into the menacing face of the beast standing over her. She had heard that a wolf could pounce at you faster than you could jump into the air, and she began to feel incredibly vulnerable out in the open like this. This was possibly the worst idea she had ever had.

The wolf's brow furrowed and he began to walk towards her almost curiously, taking his time and scrutinizing her with his fierce eyes. The intensity of his gaze made her waver slightly as he approached, and she lowered her wings, feeling extremely foolish. She should have known that this kind of spontaneity only ever worked with Shade. Everything always worked for Shade.

She cast a nervous glance up at Chinook, circling slowly above her as low growls began to permeate the crowd surrounding her. She wondered why he hadn't stopped her before, because now he would be of no help if things got dangerous.

Finally, after an agonizing period of time, the wolf stopped, standing no more than one pace away from her. His eyes had never once left hers, and the intelligence of his gaze almost made her relax for a moment, before he began to lower his head towards her. Slowly, the teeth grew closer, and she could smell the meat in his breath as he looked down at her. Just as she feared that he was about to eat her, he spoke.

"So why is it you've come here, then?" he asked simply. To her surprise, his tone was not unkind or threatening, but it still carried some vague growl within it that made it impossible to decipher his mood.

She wanted more than anything to just fly away right then and give up on the whole thing. They could find a way to stop Goth without the wolves' help, couldn't they?

Marina paused and took a deep breath, steeling herself. It was difficult to keep her thoughts straight in the face of such a beast, but she knew that she had no choice. She had to convince them to help, whatever risks where involved. Remembering Zephyr's assurances, she tried to speak again.

"I…I've come to ask for your help—"

"Help!" someone in the crowd exclaimed indignantly, scoffing at the idea. At a terrifying pace, more discontented murmurs broke out, and Marina felt her heart sink. This must've been the first time since the Great Battle of the Birds and the Beasts that any creature had ever asked the wolves for help.

"Now, why would the bats need our help?" the wolf asked, silencing the jeering crowd with a flick of his paw and baring his teeth slightly. The facial gesture could've been anything—a threat, a smile, a grimace—but whichever it was, it was indescribably terrifying.

"We…uh…"

Marina couldn't find the strength to continue. This was hopeless. How could Zephyr have been so confident in her? These creatures looked like the most unfriendly beasts on earth—even more so than the Vampyrum Spectrum. They weren't going to help them! She'd be lucky to leave with her life!

In all honesty, she half expected to be killed there and then, but to her surprise, the wolf drew back somewhat, almost as though he were respecting her space.

"I'm sorry," he apologized. "I didn't mean to intimidate you, I was merely curious. Perhaps I should introduce myself. I am Brennus, and these," he said, indicating the crowd of wolves surrounding them via a quick jerk of his head, "are my wolves. I hope their poor manners have not frightened you."

Marina nearly laughed, but her throat was too tightly clenched to let anything out.

"I know we may not seem a friendly bunch," he continued, "but that is only because we are out of practice. Few creatures ever dare seek an audience with us for fear that we would eat them in the blink of an eye."

Marina lowered her eyes slightly in guilt. That was exactly the thought that had been running through her own head, and who could really blame her? Something made her feel slightly ashamed, however, for though it was hard to tell through the rough barking voice of his, Brennus had sounded almost hurt as he spoke his last sentence.

The wolf paused for a moment as though hoping for her to respond, but she still couldn't quite bring herself to speak. He seemed tolerant enough—but then again, Goth had seemed pretty chummy until he had decided to try to eat her.

Brennus sighed tiredly, realizing that his speech was having little success at improving Marina's confidence. "I have heard of you, believe it or not, Marina Brightwing," he said. "Yes, some very impressive tales have reached me through the voices of our friends, the rats. King Romulus speaks most highly of you, and I have great respect for what he has done for his kingdom. I cannot imagine why an accomplished bat such as yourself would need the help of us wolves—or indeed creature. I beg you to indulge my curiosity."

Marina felt the sensation gradually returning to her limbs. Whatever she had been expecting, this was not it. Brennus seemed…reasonable. He was polite, he didn't sneer or act superior, he maintained eye contact without being unnerving—she had experienced less welcoming conversations with fellow bats. She wasn't sure if she believed him about the rest of the wolves, but he at least seemed friendly.

He was also much more knowledgeable than she had suspected, and she felt bizarrely flattered by his words despite her predicament. She began to become somewhat hopeful: if he already knew what had happened in the Jungle…

"If you've been speaking with King Romulus," she began again, growing measurably more confident. "Then you know of the Vampyrum Spectrum?"

"The giant cannibal bats of the south?" Brennus asked, raising his eyebrow. "The ones that imprisoned bats, and rats, and owls for sacrifice? The ones that tried to raise their demonic god from the Underworld? You shouldn't be surprised," he added calmly, gauging Marina's expression. "News travels quickly, even to us. Yes, I have heard of these creatures."

Marina nodded respectfully, grateful that Romulus had inadvertently saved her yet again. She was certain that she would've sounded half-crazed if she had been forced to explain everything from scratch.

"Well, I came to warn you that they are collecting sacrifices again," she said, "and to humbly request your help in sending an army to the southern jungles."

A number of the wolves in the crowd laughed malevolently at these words, some even jeering audibly. She refused to pay them any attention, however, focusing on Brennus in front of her. Despite the derision around her, she was glad that their leader had better sense than they did as his face grew grim with understanding.

"They are at it again?"

"Yes," she said somberly, "and the bats are afraid that we won't be able to stop them this time—not without your help."

The wolf leader frowned for a moment, sighing heavily before turning away from her. For a while, he stood there in silent contemplation, staring out across the mountaintops and glancing towards the Human city below.

"I would like to help you," he said finally, "but we have our own problems to face."

"I know it's a lot to ask," Marina conceded quickly, feeling desperate, "but if they succeed in killing the sun, it will mean the end for all the beasts, including the wolves."

Brennus turned to face her again, looking fearfully uncertain of how to act. She could see the conflict in his eyes—the same one she had felt towards letting Griffin go on to Bridge City without her. As she contemplated that he might truly care for his comrades, she realized that the other wolves had gone silent as well. It was as though their attitude had been an attempt to distract them from bad times.

Eventually, Brennus opened his mouth to respond, his eyes regretful. In that instant, something in his demeanor clicked for her, and before he could refuse her again, Marina blurted out what Zephyr had told her.

"I'm sorry, but—"

"I know why you're meeting here," she said quickly.

At once, the crowd let out a stunned gasp, their sheer number forming the separate intakes into an eerie whistle of wind. Brennus's open jaw closed slowly and his ears twitched anxiously.

"Surely you can't know—"

"Your cubs," she said quickly, "something's been killing them, hasn't it?"

She heard nervous whispers sluice through the crowd at her words, and again the effect was ghostly. Brennus seemed less shocked than the rest of the crowd, however. In fact, he seemed almost resigned.

"How do you—?"

"The vines," another wolf said, stepping forward. From the voice, Marina assumed it was a female. There was something softer in its barking tone, but also something sinister.

The other wolves quieted and Brennus turned to the speaker in silence for a moment, as though he were considering her carefully. After a long pause in which the two wolves stared meaningfully into each other's eyes, he nodded almost imperceptibly.

"Continue, Moa."

She bowed respectfully before turning to address her. As the wolf stepped into the circle, Marina decided that there was something more deeply terrifying about this wolf than any of the others, but she couldn't quite figure out what it was. The air around her seemed to be charged with fear.

"My son," Moa began woefully. "He was taken from me by the vines—the living vines that come in the dead of night. They ensnared him, dragged him away from me. They sucked him through a hole in the ground."

The wolf's voice began to tremble, and Marina shivered, knowing all to well what would come next.

"The last thing I remember after he disappeared was a faint hissing sound coming from the hold at the base of a tree—an unearthly hissing sound. I never saw him again after that."

The wolf lowered her head sadly, and now Marina understood what had been so terrifying about her before: the pained look in her eyes reflected the same terrible sorrow she herself had felt when her own son had been sucked into the Underworld. It was strange, but she found that she was suddenly feeling sorry for Moa, and she was beginning to see what Zephyr had meant: the wolves really weren't as strong as she had always thought. In the end, they were all in danger.

After a long pause, Brennus turned his eyes on Marina once more.

"You can explain this?" he asked flatly.

"It's Zotz," she said grimly, shaking her head. "It's the god of the cannibals. He's growing stronger each time they make a sacrifice in his name. Soon he'll be strong enough to take the older wolves too."

For the first time, the vast circle of sneering beasts seemed to understand the direness of their situation as a pure, bleak silence followed her words. For a long time, the only sounds that reached her ears were her own shallow breathing and the thumping of her heart as it beat rapidly in her chest.

"Very well, Marina Brightwing," Brennus said finally, closing his eyes sadly at the prospect of war. "We will help. If what the rats say is true, you bats are gathering at Bridge City. Is this correct?"

Marina nodded.

"Good. We will be there."

* * *

><p>Bridge City was a crowded place, to say the least. Never in his life had Griffin seen so many bats all gathered in one spot before. The entire underside of the vast structure seemed to swell and churn constantly with their movement, as though it were a ghostly black sea caught in a raging storm.<p>

There was something instinctually reassuring about being near so many of his peers. He didn't know exactly what it was that made him feel so optimistic as he approached the towering bridge, but it was thoroughly comforting. It almost alleviated some of his nagging fears, for surely nothing—not even Goth—could stand up to these millions and millions strong—could it?

Feeling in measurably better spirits, he glanced over at Luna cheerfully. She was still a little miffed at him, he could tell, but she was no longer avoiding him, and it felt good to her have by his side once more. They had only been apart for a few hours and yet it seemed to him like she had been gone for ages.

As the colony finally came up to the vast, Human structure—boldly stretched out across a wide, raging river—Griffin could see the excited glint in his mate's eyes, eagerly taking in the bustling scene around her. No doubt she thought this was all terribly good fun, another adventure. Despite himself, he had to admit: this definitely _was_ more fun than sleeping through the winter.

The two of them flew in close behind the elders as Aurora, Lucretia, and Ariel were met by one of the bridge's representatives, immediately diving into a heated discussion. Listening on, Griffin gathered that they were trying to organize a meeting with the other colony leaders so they could deliver Zephyr's message and rally troops.

He thought impulsively of the famed elders that roosted atop the bridge's tallest tower, where some of the most distinguished bats of the northern colonies gathered to discuss important matters, the subjects of which Griffin could only guess. Next to his father, they were probably the most well-known bats to have ever lived.

Signaling for the rest of the colony to wait below, the Silverwing elders began their tight spirals towards the bridge's formidable peak, and for some odd reason, Griffin found himself sincerely disappointed that he wouldn't be coming along for the meeting as well.

"Come on, Griff," Luna whispered surreptitiously as she made to follow Lucretia and the others.

His heart nearly stopped as she pulled up towards the tower. "Are you crazy?" he shot back in a harsh whisper, grabbing her tail with his claw and dragging her back. "We can't go up there!"

"Why not?" Luna asked impatiently. "What's the worst that could happen?"

She stared at him expectantly, but it was not the same humorous look she usually wore whenever she asked him that question; this time, her face was more in tune with the expression Skye, Rowan, and Falstaff always made around him—that look of exasperation that he was ruining their fun.

Unfazed by the annoyance in her gaze, Griffin's mind worked furiously to play out the scenario, coming up with an answer for his mate as she waited edgily.

What _was_ the worst that could happen? The way he saw it, they could be caught and yelled at; they could maybe embarrass themselves somewhat, but nothing more really. Maybe he was tired, maybe his heart just wasn't in it that night, but his mind could glean no more. He couldn't believe he was thinking it, but being yelled at really didn't sound so bad to him—well worth the risk. Feeling some trepidation despite his musings, he found himself agreeing with her.

"You're right," he said finally. "Let's go see what they're saying."

* * *

><p>Inside the specially made roost perched high above the immense bridge below, a dozen or more elders and dignitaries hung importantly from their metal struts, all looking grayed and wizened with age. He could see his colony's chief elder, Lucretia, roosting across the tower from where he was hiding. Aurora and his grandmother, Ariel, were beside her. Across from them, he could see Halo Freetail hanging impressively, the famous elder of the Freetails, the largest of the northern bats, and beside her…<p>

"Achilles Graywing!" Luna whispered excitedly.

"Shh!" Griffin whispered anxiously. Now that he was actually here, peeking in from the tower's outer ledge, he felt much less confident in his decision to eavesdrop on the elders' meeting.

"I wonder what they're talking about," she pondered out loud, skillfully ignoring Griffin's protests.

He must've been crazy to think he could've convinced Luna to be quiet—when had she ever been quiet in her life? At this point, the best option was to simply humor her questions in the hopes of avoiding an angry fit. Admitting defeat, he flared his ears, trying to catch the words of Halo Freetail as she spoke.

"Something about the Humans," Griffin mumbled, "She says there've been a lot of them marching across the bridge lately—more than usual, I guess. Some big, armored machines too."

"Sounds like their having a war of their own," Luna commented seriously.

After a while, the talking died down and the Silverwing elders rustled their wings slightly.

"I think Lucretia's going to talk now."

Griffin watched as the old bat took up her position in front of the assembly, the whole of the tower's attention focused on her as Ariel and Aurora roosted on either side of the elder. As they faced their audience grimly, the three bats suddenly seemed much older than he had ever remembered them, and he caught himself wondering dismally how they would fare in battle.

"My friends," Lucretia began gravely, "I'm sure you've all heard of the treacherous acts committed by our Vampyrum cousins to the south."

"A terrible story," Achilles nodded, "One of our darkest moments, I dare say. If I understand correctly," he said, looking at Ariel, "we have your son to thank for stopping them."

"He definitely played the role of a hero," she told the assembly, "but it was not just Shade. Many bats helped rescue those prisoners that day—rats too. Even owls. Without our combined efforts, we never would have succeeded."

"But the point is that our forces were successful," Halo repeated definitively. "The Vampyrum failed to kill the sun."

"It was more than killing the sun they wanted," Lucretia explained patiently. "That was only a small part of it. Their true objective was to raise their dark god from the Underworld. He seeks to rule over the land of living. Without the sun, Nocturna would be powerless to stop him. We elders all know the terrible truth of Zotz's strength."

At this, a few nervous murmurs spread their way through the ranks of dignitaries like a gentle breeze, but it was jarringly reminiscent of the light wind that always prevails a thunderstorm.

"We've heard the stories," Halo corrected Ariel pointedly, "nothing more."

"He's as real as Nocturna is," Achilles said evenly, "and his presence is stronger."

"Even so," Halo continued, unperturbed, "what does it matter? The Vampyrum failed."

"They've started collecting sacrifices again," Ariel said grimly.

The ripples of shocked gasps were louder this time, now more akin to a rumbling of thunder, and Griffin watched the same fear he had felt tugging at his own chest for the past few nights reflect itself within every pair of eyes in the tower. All these bats understood the full implications of Ariel's words.

"Zephyr, the keeper of the spire, has informed us that the next eclipse is approaching fast," Lucretia continued, speaking over the anxious murmuring around her. "If we fail to act, we fear that the cannibals will succeed this time."

"But this is surely a suicide mission!" Halo exclaimed after a moment's hesitation.

"So is choosing not to act," Achilles countered calmly. He turned sadly to Lucretia, "Zephyr has never once been wrong in his prediction, as you should well remember Halo. We have no choice. The Graywings will gladly accompany you Silverwings to the southern forests."

Reluctant silence followed his words as the other elders in the tower struggled with themselves. Griffin couldn't really blame them for hesitating—if it weren't for his need to get back at Goth, he wouldn't be very eager to go either. As the quiet dragged on, Luna began shifting irritably beside him, as though furious that no one was volunteering.

"The Brightwings will go too!" one elder called out finally.

"So will the Mastiffs!" another added, after only a short pause.

"And the Short-Ears!"

All at once, the tension was broken, and leaders all around the tower were pledging their support with surprising eagerness. Bats were being offered from every corner of the north; it was almost as if Nocturna herself had inspired these bats to help. In a matter of second the grim mood in the tower gave away to glorious determination, all right before Griffin's eyes.

"Settle down, settle down," Halo commanded eventually, looking weary. The old dignitary breathed a heavy sigh, "I am loath to send my colony south towards what will surely lead many to their deaths. However, as I consider the full gravity of the situation, I see that there can be no other solution. You have the help of the Freetails."

With her words, a mighty cheer rose from the assembly, and Griffin could feel the same relief wash over himself as well. The Freetails were the largest and strongest of the northern bats; if anyone could make a significant dent in the Vampyrum's forces, it would be them.

"But," Halo pressed on, opening her wings for quiet, "I'm afraid that what I said before still holds true. Without outside help, we will stand no chance of achieving victory."

"Perhaps I can help you there."

With astonishing speed, the tower went silent again, and every single head, Griffin's included, turned to seek the source of the strange, screeching voice that had broken out unexpectedly from one of the tower's dark corners. Hidden in the shadow stood something measurably larger than a bat, hunched over and standing upright, but yet there was an element of familiarity in its appearance…

"Romulus!" Ariel cried out in greeting as the benevolent rat King stepped into the moonlight, nodding warmly in response.

"That's Romulus?" Griffin heard Luna whisper beside him, and he jumped slightly, having completely forgotten she was there.

"I guess so," he answered tersely. His mother had told him stories about the rat as a kid, and she always spoke very highly of him.

"He must've climbed that whole way just to listen in on them," Luna said in awe, "He's pretty dedicated."

Griffin nodded, looking down at the dizzyingly diminished river below. If he couldn't fly, he would never even think about climbing to such a height, even if his life depended on it. One wrong move…

"I heard that there was an important meeting being held here," Romulus said with a smile, "and I've come to pledge the support of my rats to your cause."

His words were met only by silence as the assembly simply stared at the rat King in awe, visibly shaken by his appearance. He had a very bat-like demeanor, lent to him by the thin membranes stretching between his limbs like wings, but the body was all wrong and it made Griffin felt relatively normal-looking by comparison.

After a few moments, however, Halo seemed to recover from her shock.

"That is a generous offer," she said graciously, "but even with your help, I still don't favour our odds."

"Then perhaps I can provide you with further assurance," Romulus offered, "My sentries to the east have informed me that a certain Brightwing friend of ours has successfully enlisted the help of our beast allies, the wolves."

Griffin could swear that the inhabitants of the tower had all unanimously stopped breathing. Even Halo Freetail seemed thoroughly impressed by this news. It was virtually unheard of for the wolves to help another creature; since the Great Battle, they had almost exclusively stayed to themselves. He couldn't imagine what his mother had done to convince them, but he caught himself almost growing confident in their endeavors now that they such powerful allies accompanying them. He looked over at Luna, and for the first time in hours she was smiling at him.

"Looks like Marina was right," she said excitedly. "Maybe everything will be okay."

Griffin wasn't quite sure that they were safe yet—even with the wolves helping, it would be a bloody battle; but he felt some relief in knowing that his mother had kept her promise and survived her mission. It looked like they were all going to make it through this thing after all.

They descended from the tower a few minutes later and merged discreetly into the circling colony below as the bridge representative returned to find them a place to roost. As they were lead through countless meshes of struts and wires, all filled to bursting with sleeping bats, Griffin could hear the representative mumbling something about overcrowding and having very little space left. This one time, however, he was far too relieved to worry. It would sort itself out somehow. He needn't be concerned.

It had been a good experience for him, Griffin knew, to be away from his mother like this. He was gradually finding that he could sift through his worries more critically without her constantly checking on him, and he even found that there was lest for him to sort than before. Without her around to help him, he was finally learning to deal with things himself. Maybe he _could_ get the hang of just letting things happen.

Still, despite the benefits, and though she had only be gone a couple of nights, his mother was still his only close family left besides Luna, and he missed her sorely. Now that he had so much less to worry about, Griffin felt that he would finally be able to relax properly when she returned and everything was back to normal.


	7. Chapter 7: Close Call

**Chapter 7: Close Call**

"This is no good," Chinook said, probably for the third time. Marina didn't respond, pretending not to hear him again.

On their way back to Bridge City, they had been met by a raging blizzard that now threatened to swat them from the sky. The cold was terrible, turning her bones to ice, and the snow burned her skin as it melted, soaking into her fur. She was already sopping wet, the water weighing her down, but she refused to stop: she needed to get back to Griffin.

The wind had started to turn against them as well, however. It gusted so strongly that they seemed to be pushed back twice as far as each wingbeat could bring them forward—almost as though Zotz himself were trying to keep them from reaching their destination. The sky too had long been blotted out by the swirling snowflakes, and it was with plummeting spirits that she knew it would be impossible to keep to their westerly course.

"We're just going to have to land," Chinook insisted.

Marina hesitated, desperately wanting to continue before she nodded in resignation. "You're right."

They made a quick search for a suitable shelter, eventually settling down in a shallow cave that had not yet been inhabited by some other creature.

As she roosted from the ceiling and shook the water from her fur, Marina suddenly found herself wishing that she had agreed to stop sooner. The cave was surprisingly warm, and it hid them well from the wind and snow. The turbulent air had been so bad that her wings were still singing in pain, and it felt good to finally put them to rest. She wrapped herself up tightly in her bright limbs, giving up her vain attempts to dry her body and settling for the added warmth her wings lent her.

She looked over to Chinook roosting beside her and laughed slightly: he was even more drenched than her.

"This isn't too bad," Chinook commented, taking a quick look around their roost as he shook the water from his fur. "Nice and dry; we can rest here until sunset."

Marina shook her head. "We don't have time for that," she persisted, though the sun was already rising and her body longed to sleep properly. "We leave the second this storm lets up."

Chinook looked like he wanted to argue, but instead, he just rustled his wings a little and looked out at the whitened sky, as though waiting for it to darken again. Marina watched with him, every minute feeling like an hour. How long did they have left until the eclipse, and how well did the negotiations at Bridge City go?

She shivered slightly and drew her wings in closer as a particularly strong gust of wind sliced its way past the cave's protective wall and worked its way through her wet fur. With an irrational jolt of anger she wondered why Goth couldn't leave the sacrifices until the summer—at least then it would be warmer.

"Still cold?" Chinook asked as she shivered a second time.

"I'm fine," she said, wrinkling her nose dismissively.

Jumping slightly in surprise, she felt her companion wrap his wing around her and pull her in close. Her side pressed against his gently, and as she felt his body beside hers, Marina wasn't sure that it was right for them to be roosting together in such a way. She didn't think Shade would appreciate her getting so cozy with Chinook.

However, cozy was the right word for it as she felt her doubts melt away in the warmth and comfort of having another soft body beside her after so long alone. She looked up into Chinook's eye curiously, wondering just how far his gesture was meant to extend, but his face remained passive.

"This storm could go on all day," he said softly. "We might as well get some sleep."

Marina nodded gently, painfully aware of just how tired she was. It had been a long trip to find the wolves, and this was the first time she had allowed herself to rest the whole way. Momentarily forgetting her worries—about Griffin, about Goth, about Chinook roosting beside her—she let her eyes droop tiredly and fell almost immediately into a deep sleep.

* * *

><p>"Marina."<p>

She turned away from the noise, her body still too exhausted to wake up. She mumbled something unintelligible to whoever was trying to rouse her and peeked out through a small slit in her eyelid. With a sinking heart she noticed that it was already getting darker outside. She felt like she hadn't slept at all—surely it wasn't time to leave yet?

"Marina," Chinook whispered again, "wake up. It's already dusk."

Dusk. They had already wasted so much time, and yet she still felt so tired. She honestly hadn't the slightest desire to leave so soon; then, remembering Griffin, she forced her eyes open and jumped slightly in shock at the position she found herself in.

She had unconsciously moved closer to Chinook while she had slept, pressing up firmly against him so that their fur touched all along their sides. Their bodies were obscenely close together now, and Marina felt her cheeks burn slightly in embarrassment as he looked down at her with a friendly smile.

"I'm sorry, Chinook," she said, realizing the delay she had caused. "I'm just so tired."

She spoke casually, but she was still thrown at how intimately Chinook was holding her. More shocking even was that she didn't really seem to mind, her body reluctant to move after finally being embraced again so caringly. It really was nice of Chinook to tag along with her like this, never complaining about the cold or the wind, it made the whole thing less tedious. She caught herself glancing over at his handsome face, her eyes wandering occasionally to his muscular chest as it rose and fell powerfully. Slowly, without conscious thought, her head began to press itself into the fur on his neck as she…

"We'd better get going," Chinook said suddenly.

He withdrew his wing, and the cold, bitter air sliced into her fur, bringing her back to her senses. She felt drenched in shame at the thoughts that had run through her mind only moments earlier. What had come over her? She thought guiltily of Shade, and hoped that he hadn't seen her brief lapse in judgement.

The two of them stretched quickly in thick silence before leaving the cave without word, hunting and gathering their bearings before resuming the course that would take them to Bridge City. Admittedly, the journey was much easier now, with a small tailwind pushing them along and drawing them nearer and nearer to their destination. Reluctantly, Marina realized that it had probably been a good idea to rest so that her wings had had a chance to recover somewhat.

As they flew, Marina glanced over at Chinook anxiously, who didn't returning her gaze. He was being awfully quiet. Had he sensed more of her intentions than he had let on?

"Chinook," she began haltingly, and he nodded in acknowledgement, prompting her to continue. "When we were back in the cave…"

"Don't worry about it," Chinook said readily. "It's not the first time this sort of thing has happened to me."

"I'm sorry," she said shamefully. "I didn't mean anything by it, I was just…"

"I know," Chinook said, casting her a look of understanding. "It's nice to have a shoulder to lean on, right?" He smiled, "I won't tell anyone."

Marina breathed a short sigh of relief. She knew, deep down, that she never would've let it go any further that it had, but she wondered if she had been wrong to even let it go that far. To ease her conscience, she thought back on Zephyr's words and felt her shame wash away: soon, she would see him again.

* * *

><p>Zephyr smiled to himself. All was going well, just as he had predicted. The wolves had been cooperative, Ariel had been successful at Bridge City, and it seemed that Nocturna was granting them further assurance as the hunt for sacrifices in the south ran into difficulties.<p>

Checking Marina's progress on her way to rejoin her colony, he reflected with painful sentiment on her severe loyalty to her deceased mate. Few bats would have remained faithful in those circumstances. Indeed, it seemed to Zephyr that no bat was truly immune to temptation; but fortunately, she and her companion appeared to have a firm grasp of the difference between lust and love.

Satisfied, he turned his attention to the south, tuning in to the faint echoes emanating from the Royal Vampyrum pyramid. In his mind's he, he watched the one about whom he had prophesized learn and grow in character—the one with the power to break the never-ending cycle. Only time would tell, however, whether he would ever come to realize the power which he held in his claws.

Finally, he cast his watchful ears over Bridge City once more. Ariel had done her job well in rallying the forces, but something dreadful in the near future kept drawing ever-closer—something that threatened to tear his carefully laid plan asunder. He could only pray that Nocturna would intervene in her usual, mysterious way, for it was impossible for the old bat to decipher the fate of those gathered in the legendary city.

* * *

><p>For the first time since leaving the spire, Marina felt herself finally relax as she and Chinook crested a small hill, the bright silhouette of Bridge City unrolling before them. The sheer spectacle of so many bats all gathered in one place was breathtaking, and as the vast bridge drew slowly closer, it was impossible for her to keep her confidence in check.<p>

"It's going to be hard to leave this place," Marina sighed, thinking forward to the long journey ahead of them. "I almost wish we could just stay here."

"I don't know," Chinook said warily. "I remember hearing that the Humans were getting a lot more active around here. Maybe it's a good thing that everyone will be leaving soon."

Marina frowned over at him. "The Humans haven't hurt anyone here before," she replied skeptically. "What could possibly hap—"

She found herself squinting suddenly as a blinding flash of light erupted before her, and without warning, the bridge burst into towering silver flames in her mind's eye. She nearly forgot to keep beating her wings as it exploded not once, but several times at seemingly strategic points along its vast length. She watched in horror as the millions and millions of bats roosting along the structure lit fearfully from their roosts, desperately flying for safety as their friends and family burned in the flames behind them. Most fled in vain, however, as the explosions continued to ripple across the bridge, the heat outstripping them and consuming their small bodies.

"Oh no," Chinook breathed, staring dumbstruck at the plume of smoke ahead.

Even from a distance, Marina could feel the hot air burning at her face, and the light was still so intense that she kept her eyes shut tight. Again and again the thunderclaps of sound hit her like a punch to the gut, sending silver sparks bursting behind her eyelids. Millions of shrill and anguished screams filled the air, mixing helplessly with the deafening roar of the explosions—the sound of bats frantically trying to get clear of the raging flames. It was utter chaos, and she couldn't bring herself to believe it was happening.

Without even a moment's hesitation, Marina shot towards the bridge, ignoring Chinook's warnings as she watched the blackened structure collapse into the water below. She beat her wings furiously, adrenaline and fear pushing her to fly faster than she had ever flown in her life. _No!_ she kept screaming to herself, _Not him too!_

The heat became almost unbearable as she approached the flaming wreckage, most of which had already sunken deep into the raging river below. She could see thousands of specks in the blood-darkened water.

Bats. Some were unconscious, some were even dead probably, but most were frantically trying to launch themselves back into the air, getting sucked dreadfully under the surface as the sinking debris created heavy undertows. Was he one of the thousands down there right now, drowning slowly?

"Griffin!" she called out pointlessly through the din. "Griffin! Luna!"

Each time he failed to call back, she felt her panic multiply, killing any chance of clear thought. She called again and again, her skin burning beneath her fur as the fires continued to rage on below her.

"Griffin!" she cried again hopelessly.

"Mom!"

She felt her heart start beating again as she spun around tightly in mid air. The sound came not from the water below, but from behind her. He hadn't drowned.

"Griffin?"

"Over here, mom!" she heard her son call out. His voice sounded slightly choked, but otherwise perfectly fine.

Searching thoroughly with her echo-vision, she caught his distinct outline shifting amongst a thin scattering of trees, lying only a few hundred wingbeats from the fiery scene behind her. Her heart leapt as seeing him all in one piece and she quickly made her way closer, willing her tired body to keep going.

Finally, she saw him with her eyes, his silver, bright-streaked body darkened by soot as roosted alongside a sizeable group of other bats, looking terrified. As she flew over to him, she saw that he had his wings wrapped protectively around the bat beside him.

"Griffin!" she breathed as she landed next to him, sighing in relief. She wasted no time in wrapping him tightly in her wings, practically suffocating him as she felt her eyes begin to water.

"I thought I'd lost you again," she said thickly.

"I promised you I wouldn't die, remember?" he answered weakly.

Marina choked out a quick laugh, drying her tears in his fur as she nuzzled him. She wanted more than anything to just stay there with him and never let him out of her sight again, but she knew she couldn't. With one last sniff of his scent, she released him and studied him critically.

Everything seemed in tact: no burns, no scratches, no broken bones—he was just as she had left him, if a little more scared. Satisfied, she cast a quick look around her and saw that the entire Silverwing colony had gathered there—roosting in the thick growth of trees just a short ways off of the now ruined bridge. As her gaze passed over the somber faces, she could see the bright flames reflected in each pair of dark eyes, and mixed into the image was the same numbing fear she had felt inside herself.

"You're all here?" she asked her son finally, thinking of Luna, Ariel, and Cassiel.

"The bridge was overcrowded, so we were told to roost here for the day," Griffin told her grimly. "We were lucky."

She breathed a deep sigh. "I'm just so glad you're safe."

As she spoke, she realized that her son was shaking a little. She could almost feel the fear radiating off of him like fire, yet he seemed strangely calm. In fact, he was handling everything with surprising calmness—more so than she would have ever thought possible of him. At any rate, he was coping much better than the bat he held tightly in his embrace. She was trembling violently, even whimpering slightly, and with a jolt Marina recognized that it was Luna.

"Luna?" she asked anxiously.

"I think it's too much for her," Griffin explained concernedly. "The flames and everything."

Marina nodded, remembering all too well. She glanced out at the disorganized and frenzied rescue operation already underway behind her and sighed. She could still hear thousands of cries renting the air, but the fear in their voices had been replaced with despair.

"I'm going to go help gather the survivors," she said after a moment, "You'd better stay here with Luna."

Griffin nodded every so slightly. "Be careful," he called out after her as she flew off towards the burning wreckage that was once Bridge City.

He watched her bright body slowly shrink into the dark could of chaos before him. The whole thing felt terribly hopeless: thousands of bats, just tiny specks from this distance, were milling around piteously in the river—some dead, some dying; the flames were still as strong as ever, not showing even the slightest sign of weakening; and the starry sky was hidden behind a dark, towering plume of smoke, bats perpetually flying in and out of it—searching or fleeing, or simply trying to feel as if they were in control of something.

Tearing his gaze from the looming flames, he cast his eyes down at Luna, who was shaking terribly beneath his wings, her eyes shut tightly.

"Are you going to be okay?" he asked softly.

"I don't know," she whispered, shaking her head. "I can almost feel them again—my burns." She shuddered. "When it first exploded, I saw someone darting off into the forest, screaming really badly. Their wings were on fire, Griff," she said unevenly, "and I couldn't help it: I know what that feels like."

"It's okay," Griffin said calmly, "You're safe here with me."

"I don't know if I can do this, Griffin," she moaned, "The flames—they hurt so badly—so badly. I don't know if I can go to the jungle like this."

Griffin didn't respond immediately. Instead, he pulled her closer to him, pressing her head against his chest soothingly. In all honesty, he was afraid too, but as he looked down at Luna's quivering form, it didn't seem important in even the remotest sense. Somehow, something was telling him that he should be comforting her, and that same thing was telling him exactly how to do so as he felt her shuddering against him, crying slightly. It was only the second time he had ever seen her cry.

"It's okay to be scared," he began after a long pause. "Everybody is scared sometimes. Just look at me! I'm always scared!"

At this, she chuckled slightly. Growing more confident, he continued. "One of the reasons I've always admired you so much is that you're practically never scared—you even make me feel braver, just being around all the time. I'll never forget that when we were in the Underworld and I was ready to give up and die, you kept pushing me; you got me through it. You stuck by me, and you shouted encouragement, and you gave me the motivation to keep fighting. That's why I know you'll be great in the Jungle: you'll get us through it, no matter how bad things get."

"You're so nice, Griff," she sniffed after a moment. "You always know what to say."

She paused for a while, taking a deep breath and calming down some. Griffin was relieved to see that she had stopped shaking. "I know you worry all the time, but you never let it get the better of you. That's why I always felt so safe with you around: if it comes down to it, you can be pretty brave, Griff."

She looked up at him, her face streaked with tears, and he nuzzled her affectionately. It was only the second time he had ever seen Luna break down like this, and he was glad that it was over now. What he had said was true: she was a kind of stone pillar to him—always pushing on, no matter how bad things got. She was his one constant in his life. When the bridge had collapsed, her crippling reaction had terrified him even more than the flames and the debris. As the explosions continued to ring in his ears, he forced himself not to think of what still lay ahead for them.

"I'm sorry Griffin," Luna said after while, "about trying to force the whole newborn thing on you. It made you feel uncomfortable, and that should've been enough for me. I'm sorry."

"It's okay," he told her gently, "You're just passionate about certain things."

"Yeah," she said sweetly, "but nothing more than you."

With that, they fell into a content silence. It was strange, the amount of calm their simple words could inspire in each other, even in the midst of such chaos, but the effect was undeniable.

He and Luna had never quite been the romantic type—he simply didn't have the confidence, and she didn't have the patience—but Griffin felt that he could almost grow used to moments like this.

"By the way," he said before they fell into silence once more, "I think I like 'Celeste.'"


	8. Chapter 8: Allies

**Chapter 8: Allies**

It was a solemn group of bats that found themselves crowding the small patch of trees later that day, roosting only a short distance from the still smoldering ruins of Bridge City. The rescue operation had gone on for hours, stretching well into the morning and all throughout the day. Now, as the burned, broken, and somber remnants of the great city awaited the decision of their leaders, survivors were counted and recounted, missing allies tallied and identified, injuries assessed and treated; and as the sun began to dip below the horizon again, the final numbers were heartbreaking.

Of the millions of bats that had once called the underside of the vast Human structure home, only a few hundred thousand remained. Countless others had lost their lives—most to the flames, many more to the cold river below—and among those that lay dead were some especially tragic losses.

Halo Freetail and Achilles Graywing, to start, had both lost their lives, one survivor having watched their bodies drift lifelessly down the river, pulled morbidly along by the rushing current. Even more devastating was the loss of King Romulus, who had fallen from the tower to his death. Along with him died many of his faithful rats—crushed beneath falling debris and collapsing tunnels below. At the end of the day, it was just another set of names to add to the already staggering losses.

In the grim silence that now blanketed the remaining bats, the same question could almost be heard whispering its way through the trees' branches, as though the wind were yearning for an answer. Every bat was wondering the same thing, and none were yet prepared to answer.

"We have suffered terribly these past few hours," Lucretia began solemnly, the entire group silently accepting her leadership. "We can do nothing for those who have died, but we can do much for those who yet live on. We have lost brothers and sisters, sons and daughters, mothers and fathers, friends and family—and now we must ask ourselves if we can carry on. Will we carry on?"

No one spoke. An uncomfortable rustling scattered itself throughout the gathered bats as each looked at those around them. In the depressing shadow of such hefty losses, it was unthinkable to risk furthering their anguish through what now seemed a hopeless endeavor to the south. What chance could they stand against the Vampyrum after their numbers had been so terribly diminished?

"I know it is hard," Ariel said as the silence dragged on. "But we must remember that the Vampyrum are not resting. We lost countless of our fellow bats this day, but if we do not act, we are all liable to meet the same fate. As I look out at these pained faces, still hundreds of thousands strong, I have no doubt that Nocturna has helped us this night. How else could it happen that we did not all die in the blaze?"

Some half-hearted murmuring permeated the crowd at her words of encouragement, though they still seemed wholly unconvinced. Griffin didn't know if he felt very lucky at all himself. Sure, he had survived a lot, but was that Nocturna's doing, or was it pure chance?

In light of recent events, these things almost seemed laughable to him now—all those years of small, mundane worries felt almost wasteful now that he was faced with such dire circumstances. How was it that so much had been torn to shreds in so short a period of time?

Still, he realized, no one had yet spoken—no one had dared to suggest what they all knew to be true. He was probably the most frightened of them all, but there seemed to be some part, deep inside him, that knew they would have to fight. As the quiet dragged hopelessly on, he felt something inexplicable and new arise inside of his fear, inside of his panic. He felt…_angry_. Angry that no one was speaking out, that everyone was so silent.

"We have to go to the Jungle," Marina said, adding her voice to the cause when no one seemed on the verge of answering Ariel. "We have no choice. This incident doesn't change anything. If we don't fight, Zotz will rise, and it will be no better suffering his tyranny than fighting to the death against the Vampyrum."

"She's right," Luna whispered after a pause. Then more loudly, "She's right. We have no choice."

Griffin looked over at his mate grimly, but also with a sense of pride. This was the type of thing she was good at. Nothing could ever keep her down for long. After receiving a small nudge to his side, he added his voice to hers.

"She's right," he said dismally, "We have to go."

As his words faded into the night and the trees fell silent once more, Griffin began to feel slightly deflated. Was this it? Would these bats never recover from their stupor?

Then, finally, murmurs began to break out, whispering their way through the crowd of bats, growing measurably stronger with each passing second.

"I say again," Lucretia interjected. "Do we head to the Jungle? Who will come with us?"

With surprising speed, a wave of confidence seemed to flow through the crowd of bats, infecting them all. It was inspiring to watch as, slowly but surely, every single bat in sight courageously lifted his or her wing into the air, grimly volunteering for the dangerous task ahead. It was impossible to discern one arm for another, and those too far out to be seen shouted their support with proud determination, the sound quickly becoming overwhelming. After a few minutes, Lucretia raised her wing, waiting patiently for the roused bats to quiet again.

"Let it never be said that we bats are cowards," she said with a proud smile, "but I'm afraid that we must now face a hard truth: we may well be far too weak a force to stand any chance of victory. We must now consider—"

"Owls!"

The elder stopped mid-sentence, as a piercing yell emanated from the crowd. She stared questioningly at the bat that had interrupted her, turning to look behind her as he promptly pointed to the sky with his wing.

Sure enough, there was a small arrowhead of bright-plumaged specks approaching dauntingly from the south. As they drew closer, a sort of stunned awe descended upon the bats, taking in the sight of the majestic creatures as they flew silently through the air.

"What do they want?" Griffin heard someone ask with a trace of trepidation in her voice.

"Why would the owls send soldiers?" another whispered loudly.

"I'll go speak with them," Ariel said, flashing a small smile to Lucretia. "I've dealt with owls before."

"Be delicate," Lucretia warned her. "These are awfully suspicious circumstances."

"Indeed they are," a deep, hooting voice sounded suddenly.

The entire crowd seemed to jump in collective shock as a large, white owl touched down gracefully beside the Silverwing elders, ruffling its feathers a little before coming to rest. It was only one bird, but Griffin was terrified nonetheless.

"Exactly what—?" Lucretia began indignantly before Ariel cut her off.

"Orestes?" she asked in disbelief. "Is that you under those adult feathers?"

She was smiling warmly and Griffin looked over at Luna in confusion: since when was his grandmother on a first name basis with any owls? His mate didn't meet his gaze, however, staring intently at the formidable creature now perched beside Ariel. She seemed to be visibly awed by the owl's presence—not that the size was at all unimpressive, but she had seen countless owls before. Of particular interest to her, it seemed, were the lighting-bolt shaped patterns in his plumage, almost like the ones on…

"It's King Boreal's son," Luna whispered excitedly, finally looking over at him. "The one that helped your dad make peace with the owls! He's saved Shade's life once or twice!"

"That's Orestes?" Griffin asked, feeling Luna's awe gradually infect him as well.

"Ariel?" the owl asked uncertainly after scrutinizing the elder for a moment. "Shade's mother?"

She nodded eagerly, and Orestes's feathers crumpled around his beak, forming what Griffin assumed to be some sort of weird owl smile.

"I should've known your lot would've had something to do with this mess," he joked. "We heard reports of a fire near Bridge City, so we came to investigate. The Humans have been getting really active lately."

"There was a terrible incident," Lucretia explained. "Bridge City is no more."

"I know," Orestes said seriously, his smile fading. "And I know a great deal of you bats usually roost here. How many have you lost?"

"Far too many," Ariel sighed sadly, "Some of our greatest leaders among them."

"I'm sorry to hear that," the owl consoled genuinely, bowing his head. "I know how it feels to lose so many of your own kind. I myself was lucky to make it out of the Jungle alive, all those years ago. Luckier than a lot of the other owls, anyway."

"That's why we've come to meet here," Ariel continued grimly, "The Vampyrum are at it again."

Griffin expected Orestes to flinch like every other creature that heard the news, but the owl didn't even blink.

"That I know as well," he said. "Some of our best owls have gone missing."

"Already?" Ariel asked, alarmed, "We only just heard about this a few nights ago!"

"That's why we were traveling north in the first place," he explained, "We were on our way to warn you."

"We plan to head south as soon as possible," Lucretia cut in. "We were gathering troops for battle before we lost the bridge."

"We fear we don't have enough bats left to even hope to succeed, though," Ariel said, a very subtle hint to her voice.

"But we will go anyway," Lucretia added firmly. "We'll not let the cannibals win so easily."

"You'd all be willing to sacrifice yourselves?" Orestes asked incredulously. "It would be suicide for you to go alone."

"What other choice do we have?"

The owl stared at Ariel for a moment, looking as though he were settling a conflict in his mind. "If the southern bats are at it again, you can't let them succeed," he said simply, "and there's no way of stopping them with such a small force."

"There aren't any alternatives," Ariel repeated.

"Then we'll come with you."

"What do you mean?" Lucretia asked.

"I can't allow you to fight this battle alone—you could never win," Orestes told her plainly, "The owls will come with you."

"Won't your father mind?" Ariel implored.

"I still owe your son my life, as my father knows well enough. Besides, he's away on important business at the moment," he added with a glint in his eye, looking almost mischievous. "What he doesn't know can't hurt him."

For the first time since the collapse of the Bridge City, a mighty cheer rose from the vast assembly of bats, and Griffin felt himself joining in blindly. They stood a chance again. With the owls alongside them, their odds were suddenly much more favourable—almost optimistic.

"So where is Shade in all this?" the owl asked Ariel through the din, "It'd be nice to see him again after so long."

Ariel gestured for the owl to come closer, and he obliged curiously. Griffin watched her whisper something to him through the persistent noise of the crowd, and he could relate all to well with the shocked look that came over the bird's face. Even over the shouting, he could hear Orestes's confused voice.

"Dead? But how—?"

"Lucretia!"

Orestes's words were swept away as a scared cry emanated from somewhere near the outskirts of the trees. A small, fearful-looking bat was streaking towards the Silverwing elder frantically, his face hysterical.

"Lucretia…coming over the hills…so many of them…they're here! They've come!"

Lucretia was trying to calm the bat down, but it was all in vain as he seemed completely overwhelmed by whatever he had seen. Who was coming? Griffin wondered, What could make someone so frantic?

Even as his mind worked sluggishly to make the connection, a stunned silence began to creep its way through the crowd, starting at its outermost edge and moving inwards ominously. Soon, every single bat had gone quiet.

Very slowly, a lone, towering wolf strode into the small, circular clearing that lay before the elders, its movements calculated and precise. Even as it sat down, respectfully bowing its head to Lucretia and the others, it was a terrifying enough sight for Griffin to behold, and he wasn't the only bat struck speechless by the sheer size of the beast. Only his mother seemed at ease—even smiling slightly like she had spotted an old friend.

Marina fluttered over beside Ariel and whispered excitedly to her while the latter looked down at the beast with obvious apprehension. As a hoard of other wolves appeared, weaving their way through the thick-grown trees and quickly covering the small forest's entire floor, the first wolf spoke grimly. It's voice was rough and barking.

"I hope we're not too late."


	9. Chapter 9: The Calm

**Chapter 9: The Calm**

Goth strode among the prisoners with great satisfaction, all locked away deep beneath the mighty pyramid's base. Birds, owls, rats, bats, and countless other creatures had all been captured and carried to this spot—some from a great distance even. Now, they all whined and sobbed and pleaded incessantly for release, telling him of family members and children—pathetic appeals for mercy.

He let out a mirthless laugh: mercy was for the weak.

He did not know exactly how many sacrifices had been collected, but Goth felt certain that the count must be formidable, for with each brief glance into the fortified cells, he could see that they were all terribly crowded. He smiled in grim delight as the pathetic creatures fought each other for food and water and even breathing room, or just snapped from the strain of their imprisonment and lashed out at their peers. They had their own god to blame for their suffering, he thought to himself, but it would all be over with soon enough.

Turning away from the last cell of captive bats, he ordered the patrolling guard to take a final count of the prisoners. He was sure that enough sacrifices had been collected, but as confident as he was in his work, he couldn't assuage the fear that he would fall short of the two hundred hearts required, failing Zotz for what would undoubtedly be the last time.

With a fleeting glance back down below, Goth launched himself up through the spiraling passageways that would take him to the higher reaches of the great temple. He flew proudly with his chin high as he passed through the pyramid's vast array of ducts and chambers towards his destination, soaring past empty chambers and reverent guards. As he flew, sunlight would occasionally leak through several small cracks in the structure's thick stone walls, striking his fur. The rays would glint and shine off of him, reflecting brightly against the queer patches of silver that had grown in amongst the usual jet black—a relic of the freakish-looking newborn to whom his life had once belonged. The strange, radiant streaks gave his wings an almost metallic look, but fortunately, his appearance was not nearly as ridiculous as that pathetic spawn of Shade's.

After some time, he finally arrived at his destination, wrinkling his nose in distaste as he entered into his queen's chamber. The small room was not a part of the pyramid he ever visited much, if he could avoid it. As it was, the reason for his dislike was hanging from the ceiling's very centre as he arrived, turned to face the entrance. She was grooming herself with the air of one who thought quite highly of herself—such a typical disposition of the bat, he realized appropriately.

He generally tried to avoid Phoenix altogether, and thankfully, she kept to her chamber most of the time, so he ran little chance of bumping into her unwittingly. Still, in the few times he had found it necessary to speak to her, she was always irritable, shooting him contemptuous glares and snide remarks. Goth hated her arrogance with a passion.

She had become even more petulant after he had insistent upon personally handling royal matters himself, forbidding her from even daring to overrule him. She imagined, he supposed with a contemptuous grunt, that she had some sort of say in everything he did, but he had set that straight quickly, explicitly stripping her of any implicit power her position might have once held. It had been the right decision, of course, but it had turned their already testy relationship into a vicious game of spite—one which neither bat had yet come close to winning.

Now, here he was, forced to open himself up to more petty insults and derogatory remarks.

"You wanted to speak with me," Goth said, trying to sound as disdainful as he could while being careful to roost excessively far from her. "So what is it?"

She paused in her grooming, raising her head very slowly to look at him. Her expression was one she might have worn when inspecting her prey, only to be severely dissatisfied in what she had caught.

"I trust you're not fouling everything up like last time?" she snarled at him, narrowing her eyelids and returning to her grooming, implying that he was not worth her attention.

"Zotz trusts me with this task," Goth said patiently, all too familiar with her aggravating tactics. "And _only_ me," he added pointedly, "Zotz is never wrong."

Phoenix grunted doubtfully, and turned away from him as though she couldn't stand to glance at him for even a second longer.

"I wanted to talk about our dear son," she said, placing a delicate emphasis on her last two words.

"What about?" Goth asked impatiently. Did she not realize that he had more important things to do than play these infuriating games with her? The priest, Nikomedes, had predicted that the eclipse would be on them in no more than a day or two.

"Well, he's not very popular," she said obscurely.

"You're wasting my time to complain that Amis is _unpopular_?" Goth shouted incredulously, flaring up quickly. "He is the heir to the throne! He doesn't need popularity!"

"How can he be expected to run a kingdom when none of his followers have any respect for him?" she shot back angrily.

"He doesn't need respect," Goth growled. "He will be feared—he is feared! A leader needs nothing more than that!"

"How is he to find a mate if no one likes him?" Phoenix persisted infuriatingly, "And he has such strange tendencies. I heard that he caught a northern bat a few days ago."

"And?" Goth asked. "It shows his skills as a hunter that he could—"

"And he let it go free!" she finished, turning to him heatedly.

Goth stared at his wretched mate in cold disbelief and his anger flagged for a moment. Surely it couldn't be true? His son was a Vampyrum—royal blood ran through his veins. _His_ blood ran through his veins. He was the son of the greatest Vampyrum King that ever lived—everything he did was representative of his father. For Goth's son to be anything less than what was expected of a Vampyrum was some kind of reflection of Goth himself.

"Was it sickly?" he asked more softly, trying to find an excuse for Amis's behaviour.

"No," she whispered, "he just let it go. Don't you realize there's something wrong with him? You've never taken the time to pay him any real attention—always leaving him alone with Nikomedes. Now look! He's grown to be pathetic and weak!"

Goth ground his teeth ashamedly. He had raised a weakling for a son. He had failed.

_But what does it matter?_ he asked himself. _Once Zotz has been resurrected, this will all be irrelevant_.

That thought did nothing to calm him, however. He could not live knowing he had failed—he despised being a failure. He would fix Amis yet. He would raise his son to be a true Vampyrum. All was not necessarily lost.

He looked over at Phoenix awkwardly. This was the nearest they had been to each other since Amis had been conceived, and it still made him feel slightly uneasy. She was so arrogant, and so vain, and so controlling. She always had to be there to ruin his plans—a constant thorn in his side. Still, there was something deeper to their hostility, something neither seemed to be able to uncover…

"Goth!"

A voice sounded from the chamber's entrance and he looked over dreadfully. A single guard hung in the threshold, not daring to enter the queen's chamber uninvited, even with Goth present. He sounded out of breath.

"My King! I counted the prisoners…"

"And?" Goth asked, nervous for the first time in his life.

"I counted—and I thought I must have been wrong—so I counted again, and—"

"How many are there?" Goth snapped, flashing his teeth.

"One hundred and ninety-nine," the guard answered, his face pale.

Without hesitation, Goth lunged, blinded by his displaced anger. Before he knew what he was doing, his fangs were sunk deep into the guard's shoulder, the bat's cry of pain and surprise hardly consoling him any. He could kill this pathetic wretch right now, he realized. It would die for bringing him such bad news. No one would question him for it. He could tear out its heart and swallow it whole and not a soul would even flinch.

Ultimately, however, he released his hold on the poor creature, realizing that it would only be a waste of time: it would not bring him the sacrifices he needed, nor would it make him feel any less afraid.

Without another word, he darted out of the chamber, away from Phoenix and the writhing guard. If they were even one short, he would have to put a Vampyrum in the place of the missing creature; but after his last failure, would anyone be willing to sacrifice themselves? To suggest such a thing could cause dissent, and Goth suddenly understood what Phoenix had meant about respect, for he had none from his subjects—nothing but ever weakening fear.

Vainly trying to push his doubts and fear from his mind, he raced towards the prison once more. He would count them himself. He would make sure that all was ready for Zotz.

Unless…

He thought back to what Phoenix had said, and a grisly idea formed in his head. Perhaps he could tear out two hearts with one lunge. Perhaps he could avert two failures in one act.

* * *

><p>Amis flew around the jungle aimlessly, thinking through things. So much had happened in the past few nights, and it was hard for him to figure out exactly how he felt towards it all. He thought of the sacrifices that were to take place, how many were soon to die for a morally ambiguous purpose, and just couldn't quite understand why they were necessary. He knew they were justified, but as he drifted vaguely towards the towering pyramid, a bitter taste began to form in his mouth.<p>

In a matter of only a few days, countless creatures—birds, bats, owls, and rats alike—had all been ruthlessly hunted by the Vampyrum soldiers and imprisoned inside the cramped cells hidden deep beneath the royal temple. Those cells had filled alarmingly fast, and yet he just couldn't bring himself to feel any pride towards the achievement.

It was one thing to imagine those prisoners killed and eaten for food—after all, though the concept of cannibalism disturbed him, he was still a carnivore, and there was just cause to killing for a meal—but it was something else entirely to kill these creatures for sacrifice. Furthermore, it was something whose importance entirely escaped Amis's understanding.

In the end, though, whenever he considered this moral dilemma, he always shook his head, reminding himself invariably that his father knew better than him. Goth had been to the Underworld; he had spoken with Zotz—spoken _for_ Zotz; he was practically a legend. If he believed in these sacrifices so devotedly, who was Amis to doubt him? Maybe they were just an unpleasant but necessary part of life.

His contemplation was interrupted as he approached the entrance of the great stone pyramid and began to ascend towards the opening. He found himself casting a quick, impulsive glance up at the sky, and noticed with inexplicable dread that a small sliver of the sun had gone missing. The growing dark crescent was small, and did not quite extend all the way to the disc's gleaming edge, but it was a chilling sight nonetheless.

Knowing that this meant the partial eclipse was on its way, Amis felt a vague curiosity forming inside him. He remembered the high priest, Nikomedes, teaching him that two hundred sacrifices would be needed to raise their god from his subterranean prison—no more, and no fewer. Now, as the moderately dimmed image of the sun burned behind his eyelids, he found himself with the sudden urge to check exactly how many prisoners had been collected.

He wasted no time in descending towards the underground cells, weaving his way through the pyramid's narrow passages with growing urgency. It was a fairly long journey, the prisoners being kept so far below the surface, but it did nothing to weary him from his cause.

As he flew, he closed his eyes tiredly. Having traversed this route many times throughout his life, he seldom needed to look where he was going anymore, sending out only the occasional pulse of sound to guide his way. In his distracted mindset, however, his attention towards his path was particularly low—so much so that he nearly slammed into his father as he came shooting up from below.

"Out of my way!" Goth snapped, thrusting Amis clear of his path with a rough shove.

Amis felt his body smash hard into the stone wall, but was uninjured. He couldn't even feel indignant towards the action as the look his father had given him hung distractingly in his mind. Goth's face had been stony and fierce as it often was, but there was an odd element of fear in his expression that Amis found unnerving.

Admittedly, it hadn't been a particularly warm greeting from his father, he reflected bitterly as he continued on his way, but he was used to this kind of treatment by now. For one reason or another, his father had never shown much interest in him—which suited Amis just fine. Despite his widely perceived heroism, Goth embodied many of the things Amis hated most about his Vampyrum peers. He hadn't an ounce of compassion in his body, he cared for none but himself, he took immense pleasure in killing—not just his prey, but smaller bats and even fellow Vampyrum at times—and he had absolutely no curiosity.

Amis was different—painfully different. He always wondered about things; he rarely took much pleasure in killing, though he was perfectly comfortable doing so for food; he always tried to be friendly, to whatever extend was possible for someone who had no real friends. Really, he didn't know how he had managed it, but he had somehow grown into something far different than either his parents or the high priest who had raised him, and it gave him a small jolt of pride to know that he was unique.

What bothered him most about his parents, though—and more so that he had ever fully realized—was the relationship they had with each other. They were so abusive with one another: His father would beat, and scratch, and bite, and talk down his mother; his mother would beat, and scratch, and bite, and talk down to his father. They were like two bats that would be perfect for each other if only one of them had even the slightest interest in the other. Indeed, it was the complete opposite of what Amis hoped for himself—though, at any rate, he was likely to die alone. Still, he reflected, that fate was better than turning into his parents.

He shook himself from his thoughts as he finally found himself scuttling along the bone-laded, compacted clay floor of the prison cells. The whole area of the temple was rank and humid, and Amis's fur quickly became sticky with sweat as he crawled and walked uncomfortably on all fours. It was not a place he really liked to visit often, but it was his duty as prince to know the exact layout of this room by memory.

Using his echoes to illuminate the grim scene before him, he realized with a strange sense of empathy how much worse these conditions were for the birds, who were likely as good as blind in the pitch black of the underground. Then again, even the bats were hardly any better off in this dismal place.

With some vague feeling of despair, he scuttled up to each cell, where he would heave and push at the stone entrance, moving it back just a bit so he could scan the inside with his echo-vision. Invariably, he would be met by the overwhelming din of screaming and crying, and the putrid smell that came from having so many bodies packed so tightly together—the smell of fear, he thought dreadfully. Even for the rats he felt a small pang of guilt. It wasn't so bad to be eaten—a short struggle, and then it was over—but this kind of psychological torment was unbearable, even to someone on the outside.

Finally, he approached the bat cell. Something told him that nothing good could come from looking inside it, but it was impossible for him to turn back now. Slowly, and with fearful anticipation, he rolled back the stone.

It was by far the most crowded of the chambers—and also the most terrifying to behold. It was like one writhing body, built morbidly from over a hundred smaller ones. He couldn't imagine how there was any room to breath or think, and he realized now that even echo-vision would be useless in the clamor of bat voices.

His eyes adjusting to the darkness, he swept his gaze over the throng of prisoners, hardly able to distinguish one from another. With each scared face that etched itself in his vision, he felt his disgust grow. How could even his father justify something so cruel as this? Still, Amis realized, this wasn't the worst part; in only a few hours, they would be laid on a stone, vulnerable to the claws of Nikomedes or his father.

As his gaze skimmed through the desolate faces, he suddenly locked onto one bat in particular. It was a Graywing, he realized—the same type of northern bat Kakios had caught so long ago, flying around helplessly. She was staring straight at him, but unlike the beseeching expression plastered on every other face in the cell, her eyes were firm and resentful, and he suddenly felt a strange need to talk to her.

"You!" he growled, assuming the demeanor expected of a Vampyrum, "What is your name?"

The bat took a few smart steps back from the entrance, though she never once broke his gaze as Amis crawled purposefully into the cell. He found himself distractedly amazed at how the others all scattered away from him, keeping a fair distance back despite the sparse space.

Returning to his original interest, he moved closer to the Graywing, realizing as the space between them lessened that she must've been around his own age—though it was hard to tell with the northern bats, for they were all considerably smaller than him.

"I asked for you name!" he demanded again, spitting slightly to hide his desperation. He didn't know why, but it felt imperative that she answer him.

"Ch…Chryseis," she answered finally, the contempt obvious even through her stuttering.

He didn't know what it was, but he felt some strange, enigmatic connection with this one bat. More than ever before, he didn't want to see this bat hurt. He couldn't let Nikomedes have her—none of them should die, really, but she especially deserved to live.

Even through her tough demeanor, he could sense the same fearful aura around her, and it heightened his remorse further. He opened his mouth, trying to think of something to comfort her—though why he felt compelled do so, he still couldn't say.

"Amis!"

His body turned to stone: someone was calling him from above, and the suspiciousness of his position only just began to dawn on him. With a last fleeting glance at the Graywing, he found himself frantically scuttling out of the cell.

"Amis!" the voice rang out again, and he recognized it dreadfully as his father's.

Hastily replacing the heavy stone against the cell's entrance, he crawled over to the ascending passageway. If he didn't hurry, Goth would wonder what he had been doing, and that could only make things worse between them.

What _had_ he been doing? he wondered suddenly. What was that inexplicable connection he had felt with that prisoner? She was just another sacrifice, no different than the countless others detained beneath the temple's foundation. She should be proud that she was serving to liberate Zotz—_he_ should be proud that she was serving to liberate Zotz. Try as he might to calm the stirrings in his chest, however, he just couldn't shake the bat's face from his mind. _Chryseis_.

Amis found his father waiting in the sacrifice room, looming over the vast stone beside his high priest. Through a carefully crafted, smooth circular hole in the chamber's ceiling, sunlight poured onto the tablet's intricate carvings, filling every engraved line and casting a terrifying shadow onto the Vampyrum's faces as they stood. The glow illuminated the entire inner circle of the stone, with just a thin shadow forming near its edge—mimicking the missing piece of the sun Amis had seen earlier. The sliver was growing.

"The time is near," Goth said as he looked down at the ever-darkening stone. With surprising speed, his usual proud air had returned, but there still seemed to be some hidden anxiety in his voice. "The eclipse will be upon us in a matter of minutes, and we must be ready to perform Zotz's bidding as his humble servants."

His father was smiling in anticipation with Nikomedes, both looking morbidly excited. After all, they were about to witness their lives' work finally pay off, and Amis tried to convey with his eyes that he was just as pleased as they were, but felt it impossible to do so as his thoughts kept straying to the strange incident beneath the pyramid.

"Two hundred sacrifices," Goth continued with malice as a struggling bat was carried in, a guard at either wing. As it kicked and screamed and fought vainly to pry itself loose, it was laid almost delicately on the stone, its wings stretched at its side. Goth grinned wickedly as he stared at the poor writhing creature. "And you, my son, will have the great privilege of tearing out the first heart."

Amis tore his gaze from the struggling bat to stare at his father in shock. Sure enough, Goth was staring right back at him, a strange glint in his eye. _He knows_, Amis thought dreadfully, _He knows I can't kill this bat. _He began to feel panic rising inside of him as the sun's glare diminished further with every second—now more than half extinguished. Every set of eyes—from the two Vampyrum guards, to his father, to the high priest, to the writhing bat on lying on the stone—all were focused expectantly on him as he struggled with himself inside.

Feeling that he had already delayed action for far too long, he shifted himself towards the sacrificial alter as slowly as he dared. So this is how it would happen, he thought, this is how his father would fix him. He wasn't going to accept his differences and move on, he wasn't going to kill a bat and offer his son the meat, he was going to force him to tear this terrified creature's still beating heart from its chest as it screamed and went limp beneath him.

All too quickly, he found himself at the victim's side—close enough to see its chest rise and fall as it breathed. Amis looked deep into its eyes, filled to the brim with tears. There was no way out for either of them; they were both to suffer his father's wrath. The bat would have to die, and he would have to be the one to do it.

As he raised his claws to strike, he was reminded all too vividly of the defiant Graywing imprisoned deep below the earth, the bat's body morphing into hers before him as he felt all of his resolve crumble. There was no way he could possibly follow through; there was no way he could kill this bat. With his claw stilled in the air, he began to prepare himself for the inevitable punishment that would await him. He could easily have his own heart ripped out for disobeying his father in such a way.

He was saved from that fate, however, when another Vampyrum came streaking into the chamber, looking terribly flustered.

"King Goth," he gasped. "An army approaches from the north—millions of them."

"That half-breed wretch of yours Shade," Goth muttered under his breath, just loudly enough for Amis to hear. "Scramble the soldiers!" he ordered. "Let every Vampyrum Spectrum fight for his or her life! Not one of those pathetic creatures breaches this pyramid, or Zotz will see to it that you pay for your incompetence!"

"Yes sir!" the bat nodded obediently, hastily departing to spread the king's word.

"Your pathetic son is too late, Shade!" Goth yelled into the sky with the air of someone trying to convince themselves of a flagging argument. "Whatever foolish allies he's acquired, Zotz will be free long before they ever reach this temple!"

A battle, Amis thought miserably. Quite apart from being worried, he felt deflated: a battle could only make things worse. It was unavoidable, though; Goth would rather have his entire kingdom slain than step down.

With a terrible pit in his stomach, he knew that there was no escaping the bloodshed to come, and in that case, he had absolutely no intention of taking a part in it. Even now, he felt his spirits sink further still as the chamber was cast into darkness, the last portion of the sun blacked out to leave only a blazing ring of intense light.

"So it begins," Nikomedes said grimly.

With that, Goth lunged impatiently towards the bat, still fearfully sprawled on the ancient stone. With one quick flick of his claw, the beating heart was ripped from its chest and tossed into his open mouth.

One sacrifice down, and one hundred and ninety-nine to go.

Taking a brave glance at the now limp carcass, Amis almost wanted to vomit in disgust. It was far too much for him to handle—the blood, the smell, the cracking bones—and his insides turned to lead as still more prisoners were hauled up to the room's antechamber by a host of burly Vampyrum guards. Wasting no time, Nikomedes and Goth quickly set into a morbid rhythm, alternating sacrifices for peak efficiency. Bats, owls, rats, and some creatures he had only heard about before all crumpled at the hands of the murderous pair. For a moment, Amis was frozen to the spot in silent horror before he finally returned to his senses. He had to leave.

Unable to stay and watch any longer, and without the slightest desire to fight the approaching army, Amis fled the sacrifice room, seeking out his safe haven towards the summit of the mighty pyramid. He could stay there until everything died down.

As he rose through the spiraling passageways, he cast a nervous glance over his shoulder at the line of sacrificial victims awaiting his father's claws. Though he felt no better with each frightened face that met his eyes, he was thankful that none of them belonged to the Graywing from before. She, at least, was still safe.

He leveled out at the very peak of the pyramid, where there lay a small chamber that was seldom, if ever, used for any formal purpose. It was quite small—hardly large enough to house more than two fully-grown Vampyrum at a time—and it suited Amis perfectly. Here, he could retreat from his father or Nikomedes or his obnoxious peers and just stare out of the sizeable opening in the chamber's walls, giving him an unprecedented view of the jungle below as it stretched out to the horizon. Now, however, it served as an excellent vantage point over the two armies below: the Vampyrum forces amassing before the temple, and the vast hoard of soldiers approaching from the north.

It seemed that the majority of the attacking force was composed of thousands upon thousands of small northern bats—more than he could have ever imagined in one spot. They formed a giant sea of dark gray waves that blotted out the sky wherever it swelled; but there were owls among them too—much fiercer opponents, he knew from experience.

As he thought yet again of the prodigious Graywing, Chryseis, he almost found himself rooting for the so-called enemies that approached so purposefully, hoping they would free the prisoners and leave him undisturbed. Maybe something good could come from this battle yet. However, as his gaze fell to the ground, he felt fear tug at his chest for the first time.

The jungle floor was heavily dotted with the outlines of tall, powerful-looking beasts he had never seen before. Large, pointed ears rose from their heads like mountain peaks and their bodies were coated in thick fur, their strength apparent in every mighty stride. One of the front-most creatures bared its formidable teeth as it let out a deep growl unlike any he had ever heard, and his skin crawled fearfully. Though the beasts were confined to the ground, Amis found himself desperately wishing they would come no closer to his pyramid as the distance between the opposing forces thinned.

* * *

><p>Safe as he was in his spire, millions of wingbeats distant from the fast-approaching battle in his mind's eye, Zephyr couldn't keep his anxiety at bay. Everything had become so confused of recent that even his sensitive ears could hear none but small fragments of the future.<p>

Many of these pieces seemed to revolve one particular Vampyrum bat, whose motives he couldn't quite decipher yet. There was potential for him to exert a great, possibly decisive influence on the fight ahead, but Zephyr could not say whether this potential would be realized.

Still more echoes spoke of a devastating blow Griffin would be forced to suffer in the near future—one from which he could not be sure the young bat would recover. Its exact nature was impossible for Zephyr to determine, nor could he could firmly decide the outcome. Did the misfortune simply surround him, he wondered, or involve him?

One thing was certain about this battle, however: the losses would be heavy. Already, he knew, Goth would be at work, performing sacrifices as quickly as he could, he frantically striving to right his reputation with his god. More worrying, even, was the faint tingling along his skin—echoes too weak for his ears to pick up. These imperceptible vibrations were an ominous sign of Zotz's forever growing unrest. Just how strong was he becoming?

Flaring his ears still more, the twinkling stars high above his spire etched themselves in faint silver before his mind's eye, and he caught himself whispering to no one in particular:

"They may need more help than any living creature can give."


	10. Chapter 10: The Storm

**Chapter 10: The Storm**

The jungle's moist air clung to their fur, making each wingbeat or each footstep laboured and slow. The ground was almost entirely hidden beneath thick fronds and spiked leaves, but what little did show through was covered in vines and creepers, all buzzing with insects. The great pyramid loomed ahead, jutting darkly into the sky as the group's vast shadow crept along the treetops. They made a terrible noise as they neared the temple, hundreds of thousands of wings all beating as one. If he had been a Vampyrum, the sound alone would have scared him into surrender.

Looking behind him now, Griffin couldn't see where the massive wave of forces ended and the sky began, and the ground below was littered with fast-moving wolves, weaving their way around trees and slowing occasionally to keep pace with their allies overhead. The battle hadn't even started yet, and Griffin was already sweating with fear.

As he gazed upon the great pyramid, wishing for it never to grow any nearer, he could see a large swell of cannibals forming against the horizon. Even from such a distance, he could sense their sheer size and frightening strength—their eyes reflecting the same grim determination he felt in himself. It seemed foolish now to think that they could have ever stood a chance against such a force. There were simply too many.

Glancing fearfully over the leading edge of his wing, he could see Luna flying on resolutely beside him. He had been worried that she wouldn't be able to continue on after Bridge City, but the fierce look in her eyes as she pumped her wings told him that she was ready for anything that was about to come. Another adventure, she would be thinking, another quest. He wished he could share in her optimism.

Over his right shoulder, his mother stuck close by. Her eyes were staring into his, and he could swear she bore the same expression he had worn a few moments ago, when he had been facing Luna.

"Scared?" she asked understandingly.

"Of course I'm scared," he said, "but dad wouldn't have let that stop him."

She touched his face with her wingtip. "You don't always need to be like your father, Griffin."

"I won't be," he said firmly. "I won't die."

She gave him a last, concerned look before they both turned their attention back to the vast army before them, growing ever closer and more frightening. The eclipse hit its peak, and as the jungle was thrown into darkness, he closed his eyes and opened his ears, relying on his echo-vision to navigate. He couldn't decide whether the bright silver glow his mind's eye lent the cannibals made them more or less terrifying, every feature sharp and sparkling. Definitely more frightening, he decided.

It wasn't just the silver glow that did it, however. There was something else surreal about their appearance—something sinister. The lines in his head were growing blurry and poorly defined, like he was looking at the world through an icicle. He shook his head and sent out more echoes, stronger ones this time, but still the returning image was too distorted for him to possibly comprehend—nothing but a silvery pool in his mind.

Opening his eyes in shock, he looked over at Luna disconcertedly. He could barely see her through the black, artificial night, but there was enough light to tell that her face was also crumpled in confusion.

"Um…Griff?" she asked uncertainly, "Is your echo-vision all blurry too?"

"It's Zotz," he heard his mother mutter grimly. "He must blocking our echoes somehow. He's done this sort of thing before."

"But how are we supposed to see?" Griffin said, his fearful mind flaring up. He heard reverberating gasps break out all around him as more and more bats lost their echo-vision, effectively going blind.

"This is no good!" Lucretia cried out somewhere ahead of him. "We'll have to turn back! We can't—"

She was interrupted by the heart-wrenching howl of a wolf below, which instantly stole Griffin's attention. It was terrifyingly pained. He couldn't see far enough below him to witness what was happening to the poor creature, but Griffin could guess well enough that blocking their echoes was not the only way Zotz was interfering with the battle.

"Half of us are going to be dead before we even reach them," Luna said, indicating the shimmering black wall of Vampyrum still closing in from ahead.

Further cries broke out below as more wolves came under mysterious attack, presumably ensnared in vines, or else some other hellish trap. Evidently, Zotz's power had grown stronger still through the darkness of the eclipse, now capable of attacking fully-grown wolves as though they were just cubs.

Griffin felt his familiar hopelessness returning to him at a deadening pace. With the beasts halted below, and the bats above them blind, only the owls were without hindrance—and for them to proceed alone would be suicide.

"We don't stand a chance like this," Marina said, her tone more frustrated than scared.

The cries from the jungle's floor grew more and more numerous, and bats began to bump into each other as they careened through the air sightlessly. Everything was falling apart with alarming speed and it seemed that they were all flying aimlessly to their death.

Just as all hope appeared lost, Griffin cast a beseeching glance up at the stars. There was only one soul that could help them now. He had never known Nocturna to show her presence much, and many newborns had expressed doubt at her very existence, but if ever there were a time for her to help, this would be it.

He shifted his gaze from one star to the next, looking for a sign, looking for something to tell him what to do. As his eyes flitted from one dot to the next, he noticed, bizarrely, that each successive prick of light seemed larger than the last. The spaces between them seemed smaller too, as though they had all somehow gotten closer to one another. With a jolt, he realized that _all _of the stars were larger than he had ever remembered them, and still they seemed to be growing.

"What's happening to the stars?" he asked his mother curiously.

"The stars? What—?" she stopped mid-sentence, her eyes glowing brightly as they reflected the swelling dots of light above.

The stars had grown larger—significantly larger—and it seemed they were still stretching. Bats looked up in awe, gasping collectively as the light struck their fur, the stars' strength building to match their size. Soon, the entire night sky was blazing with miniature suns, illuminating the jungle below with vivid clarity. Every vein in every leaf and every knothole on every tree was outlined in bright light, defined in more detail than Griffin would have ever though possible from his eyes.

"She's helping us," Griffin whispered, though it seemed that no one had heard him—they were all too distracted by the phenomenon above.

Finally able to see, Griffin looked down at the jungle floor, where he could make out the silhouettes of several wolves, thrashing and struggling against unnaturally fast-growing vines. However, Nocturna's gift was theirs as well, as everywhere the light struck them, the creepers withered brown and died, releasing their captives with a recoiling hiss. It was like watching an eerie mass of snakes have their heads severed, then writhe pitifully in their last moments of life.

"I don't know what's happening," Marina said with a smile, "but I like it."

"This feels a lot like being in the Underworld again," Luna said seriously, but she was grinning. "Bat-eating plants, strange stars, Zotz trying to stop us."

"Yeah," Griffin agreed. "Except, I'm a lot less afraid this time."

He had spoken too soon, however, as the rejoicing bats soon found themselves fewer than a hundred wingbeats from the approaching cannibals.

"Prepare yourselves," Lucretia called out. "We'll not let them have the sun!"

In the last few seconds before the massive impact, the air grew thick with fear and determination. Griffin felt time slow slightly in anticipation, everything unusually quiet, and he had the unusual sensation of swimming through the air rather than flying.

Then, the two armies clashed with a deafening roar.

With the force of a hurricane wind, the Vampyrum shot through their ranks, colliding with bats all around Griffin, sending countless of their number spiraling off course or falling to the ground, unconscious. He swerved and veered, dodging the waves of claws and teeth as countless others were struck down around him. He quickly lost sight of Luna beside him, separated by a wall of brawling bats and screeching owls, teeth glinting in the starlight everywhere he turned. He tried desperately to keep his heading, flying determinedly for the great pyramid as frightened bats slammed into his side and Vampyrum dropped down around him, attacking from above.

The attackers did their best to stay low, even as branches whipped past them at lethal speeds. They hoped to leave the Vampyrum vulnerable to attacks from the ground, well enough within range of the mighty wolves below. There was crying and screaming and shouting and howling, and it seemed that every bat and owl in sight was engaged in furious combat with a cannibal.

Just in front of him, a Vampyrum descended onto an unsuspecting Brightwing, flipping him over and lunging for his heart. As the bat struggled to free himself, a wolf leapt up from below and snatched the stunned cannibal in its jaws, freeing the Brightwing only long enough to be caught between the serrated teeth of another bat, his head going limp and lolling to the side.

Then beside him, a pair of owls wrenched an enemy off of another ally, taking a wing in each pair of claws and pulling hard. With a terrible ripping sound and an anguished yell, the cannibal's wings tore lose from its body, which then fell morbidly towards the wolves waiting below. The owls hooted triumphantly for a moment before each had its neck snapped by a comrade of their victim, promptly joining their kill on the jungle floor.

As all of this continued to rage around him, the screams becoming shrill and indistinguishable, Griffin was narrowly escaping injury himself, only just avoiding a set of thrashing jaws several times. After only a few minutes of this hellish din, he was shocked to find himself covered in blood, mixing with sweat and dew in his fur, and he couldn't be sure whether it was his own or that of the countless soldiers being struck down around him.

Glancing hopefully down below, it was clear that the wolves weren't any safer. Even as they snapped and leaped and plucked Vampyrum from the sky, the cannibals engineered cunning counter-attacks. Groups would take it in turns to distract the beasts while others raked at their eyes. Several wolves rolled over onto their sides, pawing at their faces in pain as the blood stained their fur. Still more wolves would unwittingly stray into the shade of a thick tree where the light did not penetrate, and the vines would rise again, unhindered by the starlight above. It only added to his horror when Griffin watched one particular wolf become quickly entangled, the creepers binding it malevolently. They tightened gruesomely, suffocating it and squeezing the life from its body.

There was a terrible mass of bloodshed around him, but he tried to stay alert. It was nearly impossible to remain focused, though, as he found himself hopelessly lost in the crowd of battling creatures, never able to stop long enough to take his bearings lest another set of fangs lunged towards him. Surprised as he was at how well he had avoided injury, he tried to concentrate as the temple continued to grow nearer and nearer. He forced himself to stay detached, letting nothing faze him, trying not to dwell on the whereabouts of Luna and his mother, neither of whom he had seen since the first onset of Vampyrum soldiers.

So concerted was his effort towards concentration that he felt only the slightest remorse for the elder when Aurora had her chest torn open before him, quickly dodging her plummeting corpse. Something he had never recognized before flared up inside him as he eyed the elder's killer, and he swiveled back effortlessly.

He landed on the cannibal's back, biting down ferociously on its ear, drawing a high-pitched scream that told him his opponent was a female. He struck with his claws a few times; then, before the injured bat could retaliate, he blended back into the surrounding confusion, pushing on towards the pyramid. Adrenaline pumped through him at his actions. He had never attacked another living creature before, and he was surprised that he had had the strength to do it now.

It seemed that he was not the only one overcoming his fears, however, as he spotted Luna bravely launching herself onto the back of another Vampyrum. The cannibal was caught sparring with an owl, and had to turn away to address its new opponent. Luna clawed viciously at its face, turning her abundant excitement into calm vengeance as she bit into its neck. The bat flailed around in vain, trying desperately to wrench its assailant from its back, but she held tightly. She managed to get in a few more hits before she leapt back smartly into the air as the owl snapped at the cannibal's shoulder with its beak, sending the crippled thing spiraling pathetically towards the ground. Luna looked immensely pleased with herself.

"This is almost too easy," she said cockily as she pulled up beside Griffin again. "Exactly like the owl game back home."

Griffin just shook his head and grinned. "Remind me never to get you angry."

They laughed so hard that they only narrowly avoided being hit as another Vampyrum cut through their ranks, passing cleanly between the two bats and separating them again. When it had passed, Griffin searched around him, trying to relocate his mate.

"Griffin!" he heard her scream off to his left.

He veered and caught a few glimpses of her in the spaces between a swarm of dueling bats. With a sinking heart, he saw that another cannibal had her caught around her forearms, its claws cutting through her wing membrane.

"Help, Griffin!" she screamed as she was dragged grimly away from him.

"Luna!" he cried, his voice whisked away by the sheer clamor around him.

The noise pressed in on his ears without mercy, threatening to snap his mind as he pulled up frantically, heading recklessly after her. It was dangerous for him to fly too high, he knew, for the wolves were of no help unless you were close to the ground, but he didn't care: he wouldn't lose Luna again.

"Griffin, look out!" he heard his mother call out somewhere below him.

By the time her voice registered in his mind, it was too late. A Vampyrum snapped him up in its jaws, tearing into his shoulder painfully. Its hold was tight, and he feared that he couldn't escape. Then, he thought of Luna and grit his teeth. He wasn't going down without a fight.

He twisted himself violently, bearing no mind to the burning in his shoulder as he ripped himself from the cannibal's hold. Free, he rolled onto his captor's back, driving his claw into the Vampyrum's stomach with terrible force. No matter how hard be pushed, however, it simply wouldn't break the creature's tough skin, and he was soon thrown from the creatures back.

Now, he found himself caught again, this time in its lower claws, the points tearing into his wing membrane. Pain seared through his joints, and he began to feel helplessness take over as his options were few.

So this was how it was going to end, he thought as he was flung up unceremoniously into the air and the cannibal shot up towards him from below. He would have his neck snapped by this beast, and that would be it. There would be no more fighting, no more worrying. At least he would see his father again.

He braced his body for impact just as a silver blur hit him hard from the side, pushing him cleanly out of harm's way as the cannibal soared past only a few wingbeats away. Recovering his flight, and immeasurably grateful that his wings still worked, he turned to look at his rescuer.

"That would've been a fittingly heroic death," his grandfather joked as he caught up with Griffin, "but I figure you're still too young to die just yet."

"Thanks," Griffin said sincerely, shaking slightly from the close call.

As Cassiel opened his mouth to reply, he was struck hard in the wing from above. Griffin reeled in shock and in a flash his grandfather had disappeared. Checking below him, he could see that the Vampyrum from before had switched targets, tumbling through the air now with the older bat in its clutches. As he watched the two plummet, he felt his heart fall with them. Even as all seemed lost, the old Silverwing fought back valiantly, scratching and clawing at his attacker as they spun through the air together, screaming towards the ground.

"Cassiel!" Griffin cried despairingly as the pair disappeared through the thick foliage and out of sight.

It was impossible to tell if they had survived the fall, and with another twinge he remembered Luna, whose fate was still unknown to him. First his mate, now his grandfather—how many more would he watch be taken away from him, writhing in the claws of a cannibal? With a slight burning sensation at the back of his eyes from all of the carnage he was witnessing, he descended to a safer altitude, trying to relocate his mother. She, at least, had not yet been taken from him.

He was shocked when he finally found her, grappling with a Vampyrum—and winning too, by the looks of it. He watched her thrust her foreclaw into its face, and he heard it howl terribly as the sharp point gouged its eye grotesquely. Then, before it could recover, she sank her short teeth into its leathery ear, tearing it loose in one sift movement and eliciting further yelps of pain.

Griffin had never imagined that his mother was such a fierce warrior. He had heard all the stories, but to see it in real life was awe-inspiring. With a final rake of her claws across the cannibal's thick throat, Marina pulled back from the bloody mess she had wrought, leaving it free to plummet blindly towards the ground as it clutched at its neck.

"That was for Shade," she called out proudly, sounding slightly out of breath as Griffin leveled out beside her.

"That was scary, mom," he said with a grin, and she jumped at his sudden outburst.

She whirled around in the air and nearly fell out of the sky when she saw him. "Griffin!" she cried in relief, pulling him in under her wing for a moment.

He could smell the Vampyrum's blood in her fur, and it unnerved him a little, but her usual comforting scent still managed to sneak through.

"You're okay!" she exclaimed, pulling back from him tearfully. "I thought that Vampyrum had you!"

"Cassiel saved me," he explained dully, feeling his mood deflate again. He didn't elaborate further, and she seemed to gauge from his tone of voice that she shouldn't push him for details as her face slackened once more into that look of grim determination.

Griffin glanced up ahead of him and was shocked to see that they had almost reached the pyramid—though he realized that "they" were hardly more than a detachment of a dozen or so bats. The rest were scattered chaotically throughout the brightly-lit night sky, fighting fervently against the never ending waves of Vampyrum soldiers still holding their own.

As they approached the temple, and its sheer stone face defined itself more clearly, he could see a trio of wolves ascending the temple's great stone steps, stepping purposefully towards its entrance. They snapped almost distractedly at the few cannibal guards still stationed outside, who were calling urgently for reinforcements.

"I'm going in," Marina said as they came close to the pyramid's imposing entrance way. "You stay out here."

Without waiting for an answer, she trimmed her bright wings and bolted for the entrance. He watched forlornly for a moment before, ignoring her orders, Griffin followed closely behind her, refusing to leave her side. He couldn't deny that he was afraid of dying in the mass of Vampyrum guards and rows of thrashing teeth that blocked the pyramid's entrance, but he was even more afraid of getting separated from his mother. He just couldn't help but feel that if they split up, he would lose her forever—just like he had lost his father when they had been divided.

There was only a narrow window of opportunity for the pair, as the sheer number of temple guards began to overwhelm the small unit of wolves. The Vampyrum scratched and clawed at the beasts' eyes, tearing through their skin and slicing at their ears. As the wounded wolves began to retreat, Griffin could see that he and his mother could not possibly make it past the hoard of Vampyrum soldier unnoticed. If they were spotted, there would be no escape.

Thinking quickly, he closed his eyes bracingly before singing out a rough sound illusion for the first time in his life. He had never even thought of trying such a thing before, so certain was he that he would fair miserably, but now he had nothing to lose as he did his best to cloak them in invisibility. In truth, he was still half convinced that it wouldn't work. The next thing he knew, he and his mother were shooting through the pyramid's entrance, passing within inches of a guard's face.

It didn't even flinch.

Griffin felt unbelievably elated as he found himself soaring through the narrow innards of the Vampyrum temple, still perfectly in one piece. His illusion had worked! He had done what no other bat in the colony had ever done since his father! He knew it had probably been full of holes, and even as he set down beside his mother, safe inside the temple's stone walls, he could feel Zotz tearing the illusion to shreds—but none of it mattered to him. For once, he was proud of himself, and the effect was so strong that he was able to forget Luna and Cassiel, even if just for a while, to enjoy the feeling of success. They had penetrated the cannibals' defenses.

The two bats crawled along in silence for a while, Griffin glowing in contentment at his exploit and feeling his fear become overwhelmed by joy. He was so proud, the mood persisted even when his mother, satisfied that she wouldn't be overheard so far from the entrance, turned on him angrily.

"I told you to stay outside!" she hissed at him, her eyes fierce. "It's too dangerous in here!"

"I'm not going to leave you," Griffin said firmly, unwavering for the first time. "I'm coming too."

She maintained her fiery glare for a while, looking very much like she wanted to hit him. Normally, that gaze would have had Griffin whimpering apologetically, but this was something he would not concede.

Eventually, his mother turned away slightly, heaving an exhausted sigh. "You said you wouldn't try so hard to be like your father."

"I'm not trying to be like my father!" he insisted, desperately clinging to his pride. That invisibility cloak had been his own achievement—he didn't have any help!

"Well you're doing a pretty good job it, Griffin," she said, her voice rising a little, "being so stubborn and foolish and frustrating…" She shook her head ruefully and smiled at him. "That was a pretty decent sound illusion, you know."

"You think so?" he asked, perking up.

"You saved us both. You would've made your father proud."

He smiled. "I knew they would've seen us anyway."

She nodded and wrapped him in her wings fondly. "You've sure grown a lot Griffin, I'll say that much."


	11. Chapter 11: David and Goliath

**Chapter 11: David and Goliath**

For a moment, Griffin was content to sit there, oblivious to the danger they were in. He knew he should have been worried—they were standing deep inside the sacred Vampyrum temple, steps away from where countless bats had lost their lives only a few years ago—but somehow, the relative calm of the pyramid's passageways soothed his worries. It was almost as though the battle outside simply didn't exist.

After catching their breaths, he and his mother began to scuttle along the various hallways and passages of the great pyramid again, peeking discreetly into each chamber they passed. Invariably, they were all empty, and Griffin was starting to wonder whether the Vampyrum had been really been performing sacrifices at all. As much as he hesitated to say it, the vacant rooms were oddly foreboding, like each tap of their claws against the floor was a step closer to their doom. Why wasn't there a single living thing in this entire eerie place? As his skin began to crawl with apprehension, they turned a corner, and Griffin breathed a bizarre sigh of relief. They had finally found what they were looking for.

More brightly lit than the passageway, Griffin's eyes swept over the chamber, his breath snagging in his throat. It was a larger chamber than the rest, with two entrances and a ceiling that reached impressively towards the sky. At the ceiling's centre, Griffin could see the greatly swelled stars shining through a wide hole, lending the room its bright glow. The beams of light shone down onto a large, round stone, set squarely in the chamber's center, bearing intricate carving's, whose meanings were lost on Griffin but still added to the ominous climate all the same.

Across the room, leading up to the smooth stone, Griffin could see a long line of bats, owls, rats, and even wolf cubs—all lined up neatly between pairs of cannibal guards. Prisoners, he realized, noticing how thin they all were—and jumpy too. He felt a pang of sympathy for them, understanding all too well what it was like to be constantly afraid.

Also in the room were two important-looking Vampyrum, hunched slightly in a way that added to their sinister appearance. They stood next to the stone, side-by-side. One had his eyes shut, mumbling strange words—the high priest, Griffin figured. He knew it couldn't be the same priest his father had fought, but the resemblance was striking—at least, from what he had heard in stories. Then again, nearly all of the Vampyrum looked the same to him.

The second cannibal proved to be the exception, however, as Griffin's eyes passed over the oddly familiar form—familiar in a way that made his skin crawl. The jet-black fur was uniquely streaked with stark swaths of bright silver fur, shining radiantly in the glow of the swelled stars above. There was something terrifyingly familiar about this bat.

Before Griffin could make the connection, the Vampyrum lunged onto the stone, where an owl lay with its wings spread wide open. In a quick flash of feathers and blood, the cannibal struck and reared back, the creature's still beating heart in its jaws.

The bat's face was suddenly raised into the starlight, its bloody muzzle cast into view. As the bird's limp carcass was dragged off the stone to be replaced by another victim, Griffin realized with a kind of unmatched fury who this monster was.

"Goth," he whispered under his breath.

Without even a moment's hesitation, without even the slightest ounce of thought or reason, Griffin leapt into the air. Images were flashing in his head: his father's body plummeting towards the ground, Luna being dragged away in a Vampyrum's claws, Cassiel spiraling into the foliage. Fearsome determination filled him to the brim—determination to rip Goth's heart out and return the favour, or maybe set him on fire to teach him how it felt. Something in his mind was shrieking that this was a terrible idea, but it was drowned out by the thousands of angry voices screaming over top of it.

As quick as he was, his claws hadn't even left the ground before his mother caught him by the tail and yanked him back sharply. He hit the ground hard, and felt his fury rise, looking over at her heatedly.

"I—!"

"No!" she hissed.

He wasn't listening. "Let me go!" he protested, struggling futilely against her hold. Couldn't she understand how he felt? Couldn't she understand what it had been like for him to watch his own father kill himself?

"Let me go! Let me kill him!"

"No!" she repeated, picking him up and pressing him against the passage's cold, stone wall.

"But…he killed dad," he pressed on, his temper deadening slightly at the ferocity of her hold on him.

"No. You will stay here, where it's safe," she told him firmly, flattening her ears against her head. She seemed to realize how tightly she was holding her son, for she loosened her grip slightly and took a deep breath. "Goth's mine," she said more calmly.

Griffin wanted to argue more, to suggest that they take him together, to insist that he should have the chance—but he couldn't even bring himself to open his mouth. Though her voice had softened, the blazing fire in her eyes was undiminished, and it scared him. He had never seen his mother so livid. It was all too clear to him that she wanted to be the one to kill Goth; she wanted to avenge her mate. Who was he to take that from her?

A lump began to form in his throat as he turned to look inside the chamber once more. He nodded very slightly and his mother let him go.

He was scared for her. How could she possibly defeat the bat that had killed so many others? He looked at her fretfully, wanting to say something to delay her or make her change her mind, but he realized how much time they had wasted already. The line of sacrifices was short: only three more prisoners—only three more hearts before Zotz was free. They simply couldn't wait any longer.

"I can handle these wretches myself," Goth said suddenly, dismissing the small group of guards watching over the prisoners. "I have no need of you here; go help our comrades outside!"

The guards hastily bowed their heads in obedience, flapping out of the room to do as their king commanded.

"You!" he said after a pause, pointing to the last guard as it prepared to follows its allies. "Go check that no prisoners still remain below. If I find out that you've forgotten even one sacrifice, you'll make up the difference!"

Nodding deferentially, the final Vampyrum left, and Griffin couldn't believe their luck at having the room empty so suddenly. Only Goth, the priest, and the three captives remained.

"You needn't be so agitated, Goth," the priest said calmly. "We will soon be among Zotz's most favoured servants."

"I'll take no risks this time," Goth snarled, responding with odd hastiness and urgency.

"You've performed your duty admirably," the priest continued encouragingly. "Three hearts away from eternal glory."

"You may have the honor," Goth said indifferently. "I've lost my appetite for hearts."

With that, the cannibal retreated into a small corner, sighing and closing his eyes as though anxious. Griffin wondered distractedly what was making Goth appear so troubled.

A dull scraping sound wrenched Griffin's attention away from the Vampyrum, and he turned towards the noise. From his hiding spot, he could see the first of the three remaining victims approach the stone fearfully. It was a very young owl, from the looks of it, dragging its talons wearily across the stone floor, giving off an ominous screech. Griffin wanted anything but to have to watch it die.

"It's now or never," his mother said grimly behind him.

"Just…be careful," he told her, choking up slightly.

He felt her wings wrap around him once more, giving him a last fleeting nuzzle before leaving his side. She had hardly removed her wings from his body before she already felt millions of wingbeats away.

As she flew forebodingly into the chamber, it took Griffin all of his resolve to stay rooted obediently to the spot, wincing as though each beat of her wings were a thunderclap. She picked up speed before his forlorn eyes, entering into chamber as nothing more than a bright blur. The priest merely looked up curiously as she soared across the room towards the dark, unsuspecting form in the corner, realizing far too late what she was.

"King Goth!" the priest called out, but his warning was far too delayed.

Marina's streaking body slammed into the unsuspecting Goth from the side, just as he was opening his eyes. It was a hard blow, and Griffin squinted with the impact as it exploded in his ears and sent out stars behind his eyelids. It sounded like it could shatter bone, like the cannibal should have disintegrated, and yet Goth hardly flinched.

"What—you again!" he said in evident disbelief, his eyes focusing on Marina as she retreated tactically into the shadows. "How is it that whenever I strike one of you puny bats down, another comes to take his place?"

"You didn't strike Shade down," Marina shot back, pouncing from the shadows and clinging onto Goth's head. She sank her claws deep into the taut flesh of his face, anchoring herself to the beast. "He was a brave bat that died for a noble cause—which is more than they'll be able to say about you."

Goth roared and clasped his wounded face in fury. "That little runt was a coward, always hiding behind his little magic tricks," he returned, arrogant despite his pain.

Marina continued to gouge his skin until, with a great heave of his massive wings, Goth flung Marina off of him and sent her flying into the chamber's far wall. She hit the stone with a terrible smack before collapsing to the ground, coughing a little but still conscious.

"And you couldn't be more wrong about me, Marina," he continued gleefully, reassuming his composure. "I am about to make every bat on this planet immortal—a real hero, aren't I? No, I will never die. Sadly, I cannot say the same for you."

He strutted towards her crumpled body proudly, raising his claws dramatically as though readying to strike. Marina was far from defeated, however, and she quickly dodged his blow as it descended, rolling over and wrapping her jaws around the Vampyrum's rear claws. He yelled out in pain, careening over so that she could pull herself up onto the cannibal's back.

She began viciously sinking her teeth into every inch of his flesh she could reach, tearing hole after hole. The wounds were not deep, hardly piercing the skin, but they bled terribly, and Goth let out a mighty shriek of anguish that caused the priest to look up from his next victim.

"Keep going!" Goth demanded fervently, flailing around as he tried to wrench Marina from his back. "Zotz is waiting for us—don't stop!"

The priest nodded quickly and returned his attention to the altar, driving his fangs into the owl's chest and rearing back as it let out a terrible hoot of a scream. It was so mournful and so desolate. Griffin almost felt sick, turning his fearful eyes away from his mother as the owl's body was thrown unceremoniously from the stone and the next victim approached. He hoped his mother could keep this up, or she'd join that owl—no! He couldn't think that way!

"You see," Goth said pointedly as his foreclaws finally closed around Marina's tail and he ripped her off of his perforated back. He hung her in front of himself, hanging her upside-down from her tail membrane as he spoke. "You are too late," he continued dramatically, keeping her at a distance from him as she writhed and struggled to free herself. "We are but a few sacrifices away from victory, Marina…Victory," he repeated wistfully.

"Oh yeah? How's this for victory?" she replied, pulling herself up with a great effort and closing her jaws around his flared nose.

Goth keeled over in agony as Marina tore her fangs free, ripping away a good chunk of the cannibal's nose and drawing back into the safety of the shadows once more. The Vampyrum reeled in pain, temporarily incapacitated as his snout began to bleed in gushes.

Griffin watched, frozen in his place by stone cold terror as his mother took advantage of Goth's distraction to rake him across the chest with her claws—then again, and again. The cannibal's fur began to shine with his own blood, the hair falling out in places, but he didn't show even the slightest sign of weakening. Still, she continued to get hits in on her opponent, bashing him in the side and tearing out his fur.

Eventually, Goth finally fell to the floor, moaning in agony and clutching at his wounds as Marina landed atop his chest. She pressed her foreclaw deep into the flesh beneath his chin, ready to slice his throat open no matter how tough his skin was. Griffin stared in awe at his mother's sheer fury, never once letting up or tiring. She had the most fearsome bat he had ever known at her mercy, and she seemed only moments away from sending the monster to his grave.

"Enough!" Goth yelled, pushing Marina's claw from his throat.

With a fierce grunt, he rolled over, his agility somehow unhindered by his injuries. In one heart-stopping moment, the two bats had switched positions, and now Marina was lying helplessly on the floor, pinned to the ground by Goth's immense weight.

"Ah, this is much better," Goth said, shooting Marina a hungry look, but sounding slightly out of breath.

Griffin watched his mother kick and struggle beneath the cannibal's grasp, but Goth had her immobilized. He felt his heart to turn lead. How could everything have gone downhill so quickly? She had almost had him!

Goth was practically foaming at the mouth now, staring half-crazed at his captive. Still, Marina's face never one faltered from its defiant glare.

"You know, I should thank you, Marina," Goth said thoughtfully. "You've been a constant nuisance to me—almost as big a thorn in my side as your pathetic mate. But you have made things much easier for me today. I confess, not without some shame mind you, that I have ultimately failed in my duty to Zotz. Despite all of the sacrifices I had collected, I found myself still one short. No matter, I thought to myself, I would simply have to place one of my own kind upon the stone—reluctant as they may be to oblige, they would have ultimately been rewarded a thousand times over for their courage. However, you have offered me a simpler solution. A solution that ties up quite a few loose ends, for that matter. Do say hello to Shade for me."

Before Griffin even had time to shut his eyes in preparation, Goth lunged swiftly, plunging his large fangs into his mother's chest. As her eyes went wide in shock, he reared back again with a horrible tearing sound.

It was all too quick—a small gasp of surprise from Marina's mouth before her head fell back against to the floor, her body unnaturally still.

"No!" Griffin screamed hoarsely at the top of his lungs.

It couldn't be! he thought desperately, it can't have happened! The bright, crumpled body on the floor couldn't be his mother, her chest rent in two. The small, dark, pulsating shape in Goth's jaws couldn't be her beating heart. The thick, swirling pool on the floor couldn't be her blood—this couldn't be happening!

No matter how hard he tried to convince himself, though, the yawning pit in his chest told him all too well what he had seen.

As Goth swallowed his prize and shouted out to his god, Griffin felt the pain in his chest ignite into unadulterated fury, fueling a rage he had never known as it built inside him. Without thinking, he bolted from behind the chamber's stone entrance, paying no regard to his safety, unable to even feel his furious wings pumping as he shot towards his mother's killer.

Hearing Griffin's outburst, Goth turned, looking puzzled as a dotted silver blur rushed towards him with deadly intent. His face struck the light, and Griffin realized that the cannibal's jaws were stained with blood—his mother's blood. His father was dead, his mother was dead, Luna was lost, his grandfather was probably dead or else dying—and all this was because of him. _Not anymore_, Griffin thought determinedly, _This ends now_.

Rapidly closing the distance between Goth and himself, he realized lucidly what Zephyr had hesitated to tell him back at the spire: it was he who must kill Goth—he, Griffin, and no one else.

All too quickly, he collided with Goth hard, the sheer force of the impact knocking the Vampyrum off of his feet.

"What—?" Goth spluttered, baffled by this new attack. "Who—?"

He had no time to finish his sentence, however, as Griffin set about clawing and scratching at him relentlessly, screaming madly the whole time. He could hear Goth cry out in pain, recoiling at every blow, and it still didn't seem nearly enough suffering for what he had put Griffin through.

He could hear the Vampyrum sputter out a command, ordering the priest to continue the sacrifices, but it was all meaningless to Griffin. Everything else in the entire world had ceased to exist, as far as he was concerned. There were no sacrifices, there was no Zotz, there was not even the rat having its heart torn out only a few wingbeats away—he and Goth were all that mattered.

Griffin never once let up in his attacks, his claws covered in blood—whether his or Goth's was unimportant. After taking quite a beating, Goth exploded in rage, letting out an anguished roar and bashing Griffin back away from him with a labored effort. Griffin took a moment to recover and, finally free to take in his assailant's appearance, Goth's face crumpled in furious disbelief.

"You!" he yelled incredulously, his eyes wide. "The freak? But you—"

"Shut up!" Griffin shrieked, launching himself back into the air. This monster had no right to talk to him.

He darted towards Goth, who still seemed unable to comprehend that he was being attacked by this small bat—a bat he had only ever known to be spineless and weak. Griffin was beside himself in anger, wailing on the Vampyrum without mercy, bashing him with his wings and slicing him with his claws, all while letting out a terrible hiss.

"How does it feel!" Griffin yelled at the cannibal, too livid to even marvel at his newfound strength.

Goth turned and thrashed at Griffin, trying feverishly to catch his attacker as more and more scars were added alongside the ones left by Marina; but every time he reached out, Griffin would pull away to safety again, before quickly lunging to strike another blow.

"This is for my dad!" he shouted, sinking his teeth into the base of the cannibal's ears and tearing, shearing the flap loose. "And this is for my mom!" He leapt atop the Vampyrum as he keeled over in agony, placing his foreclaws onto Goth's head and driving his claws into his right eye. Goth let out a terrible scream.

"You'll pay for that!" Goth bellowed hoarsely, reaching up behind him blindly.

Griffin rolled in anticipation of Goth's grab, but was not fast enough. The Vampyrum's claws cut long tears into his wing membrane as he pulled away, ripping holes from his strong clasp. Completely oblivious to the new burning pain along his arm, Griffin retreated back a ways, clinging to the chamber's ceiling to regain his breath. For a moment, the two enemies stared at each other, recovering from their skirmish.

"You…fight admirably…for a northern bat," Goth wheezed eventually, visibly exhausted. He did not fly up to Griffin, but simply stood on the ground to look up at his opponent with a strange expression on his wounded face. It almost brought Griffin's fear tumbling back to stare into his eyes, one bloody and mutilated. "You are a much better match than your pathetic father, I'll admit—he was nothing without his stupid sound tricks. And you mother…"

Goth trailed off, looking over at the bright body lying on the stone floor, a small puddle of blood around it.

"Well, I'm not going like them," Griffin said stubbornly, refusing to let Goth's taunts weaken him. He was sick of being weak and fearful.

"No," Goth agreed. "You've grown to be a much closer match than either of your wretched parents, I'll give you that. Really, it'll be a shame to have to sacrifice you to Zotz."

"For someone so confident, you don't seem to be in much of a hurry," Griffin returned. He could play this game too. "I would know better than anyone what someone looks like when they're scared. You're scared of me Goth."

"Scared!" he spat. "I fear only Zotz!"

"Maybe that's where you went wrong."

The words just kept spilling from his mouth, his mind rarely intervening. He supposed that he needn't be limited to condescending, fearful speech as he had been in the past.

"I've had enough of this," Goth said with evident weariness. "First there was Shade—and he was a nuisance to be sure, but I dealt with him quickly enough. Then your poor mother here—I guess she was more trouble than I ever gave her credit for, but it seemed she would follow Shade even to the grave."

He turned his eyes pointedly to Griffin. "And know there's you. As blind and stupid as Marina, and as stubborn and arrogant as Shade. But the bigger they are…"

"Enough talking!" Griffin said, sick of hearing his parents belittled by this monster. What made him think he was so superior?

He dropped swiftly from the ceiling, hoping to catch Goth off-guard and finish it quickly. There would be no second chances.

The Vampyrum laughed.

"Say hello to your dear father for me," Goth said, turning quickly and thrusting his claw into the air.

Griffin flared his wings and closed his eyes in panic, but he knew it was no use. He had been tricked. He had no time to brake, no time to turn back. Something told him to fold his wings in, as though hoping to lessen the blow as he came plummeting towards the outstretched claw. It hardly made a difference, though, as he felt the cold talon tear into his abdomen. It ran him clean through; he could even feel its tip protruding out his back.

"The bigger they fall," Goth finished, his wicked smile returning, though his bloody eye socket turned it into a terrible grimace.

Griffin felt his body losing its strength, shuddering slightly, yet he was oddly calm. It didn't make sense: he was impaled on Goth's finger, the life undoubtedly draining from him, but he felt no sadness—no surprise. After all, had he really expected to best the bat that had killed so many others?

As the cold claw pressed against his insides, he was glad that he didn't feel any pain, at least. In fact, his entire body felt strangely numb, and it was only a sense of disappointment that wafted over him. He had failed his mother, he had failed his father, and he had failed every bat still fighting outside the temple. In the end, they had fought for nothing.

How long would it be before death took him? he wondered distractedly.

Still, as the seconds dragged by, Griffin felt no weaker than he had before. He opened his eyes curiously, and saw the same expression of disbelief creep onto Goth's own face—or it was it pain?

Suddenly, Goth began to mouth something in wordless shock, his free hand pulling in to clasp at his own stomach. His eyes went wide as he freed his claw from the depths Griffin's torso, looking down at himself in confusion. He was moaning slightly.

"What is this?" the cannibal whispered fearfully, removing his hand from his abdomen and holding it up to the starlight.

It was covered in blood.

Goth was _bleeding_. He was bleeding from his stomach—Griffin could hear the liquid making a terrible sound as it splashed onto the floor. He could looked at the Vampyrum's torso in confusion, his eyes taking in the chamber's stone wall as it peeked through a gaping hole in Goth's stomach. Griffin looked down at his own body anxiously and couldn't see even the slightest scratch against his skin.

"I…I don't…understand," Goth gasped, his breathing becoming shallow. "How…?"

With one final, disbelieving look at Griffin, the Vampyrum king collapsed onto the floor, his fur quickly soaking itself with his own blood. After only a few moments, he stopped breathing entirely.

Griffin felt himself collapse as well, falling to the floor beside the cannibal's lifeless form, feeling equally puzzled. As confused as he was, he was much too tired to even try to conceive what had just happened—for all he knew, as he felt his vision waver and his ears become sluggish, his exhausted mind was hallucinating. Had he just killed Goth? Was this whole thing just a dream?

The last thing he could remember seeing before losing consciousness was the high priest, standing less than a wingspan distant from him as he removed a rat's lifeless corpse from the stone and hauled a struggling Graywing on in its place. In his final moment of clarity, Griffin registered that the sacrifice must not continue, that this was all real and that the bat must survive or Zotz would reign forever—they would fail. It was with a strong sense of despair, however, that his body succumbed to its fatigue and everything went black.


	12. Chapter 12: Saviour

**Chapter 12: Saviour**

Amis surveyed the battle as it raged on before him, safe in his hidden, lofty chamber. Both sides had suffered immense losses beyond counting, and he struggled to understand what could possibly be gained by this. Was it doomed to forever be this way—with bats sacrificing fellow bats, only to have more bats raise an army to fight those bats? In the end, all that ever remained was a pile of bodies, thousands of dead bats lost to some vague cause—and then the cycle repeated.

It had gotten to the point where he began to feel the same pity for every impaled bat he saw struck down before him, be it a northern species or a fellow Vampyrum; and it was without even the slightest bit of sadness that he watched his mother cry out agonizingly, crushed between the powerful jaws of one of the fearsome, ground-dwelling beasts below her. Why should he miss her? It was the perfect end for her—exactly what she had deserved. After all, she was partially responsible for all this suffering. Like his father, she had always been so concerned with the unachievable goal of pleasing her god, and she, like him, had been fairly absent in his life. He doubted he would even notice that she was gone.

As the eclipse dragged on and the skies grew thinner and thinner, Amis finally came to a decision. Settling the conflict inside him once and for all, he leapt from his roost and descended purposefully towards the sacrifice chamber, hastening feverishly when he was no longer met by a line of prisoners outside the room's entrance. _Please don't let me be too late,_ he thought grimly, though he didn't know who exactly was meant to answer his appeal.

A few seconds later, with a sharp turn, he finally set down inside the chamber, flanks heaving in his haste. His hurry washed away slightly, and he paused for a moment, his urgency momentarily forgotten in awe of the scene before him.

Everything seemed to be covered in scratch marks or blood, as though an entire war had been fought and lost within the small chamber. The body of a bright-furred bat lay on the floor a few wingspans away from where he stood, its chest torn open. Not far from it lay another bat, its abnormally-furred body covered in gashes—the hair pattern reminded him of his father's fur, but it was much brighter than Goth's dark coat. Fortunately, this bat was still alive; Amis could see its chest rising and falling slowly. Finally, resting in a particularly large and dark pool of blood was his father. A wide hole had been torn through his abdomen, as though he had been stabbed, and yet Amis found himself feeling no more than the same vague tremor he had experienced for his mother, and whether that was sadness or relief he couldn't quite say. Perhaps just some small inkling of shock.

After a few moments of assessing the terrible state of the room, his eyes came to rest on the high priest, Nikomedes, looming over the stone with his claws raised high, and below him…

"No!" Amis shouted, rushing into the room just as the priest's claws descended towards the writhing Graywing below him. "Don't!"

Nikomedes didn't hear him, and so he sped up, bolting towards the stone as quickly as he could manage. So many had already died, he realized painfully, he had already waited far too long. His inaction had caused so much bloodshed, but this he could still do, this he could still stop. He wouldn't be a failure like his father; he was going to fix everything.

Nikomedes's claw finally came into contact with the Graywing's chest, and at the same instant, Amis slammed into her side. She was pushed out of harm's way just as he felt his wing tear on the priest's lowering claw, ripping his membrane as he slid across the blood-slicked stone and onto the floor with a grunt.

Being smaller in size, the Graywing's body soared across the room with the force of the impact and slammed hard into the far wall, knocking her unconscious. Amis writhed and struggled to get up, desperate to assess her condition, but he was simply too badly injured to move much. It was not quite the rescue Amis had hoped for, but at least the Graywing was still alive.

"My prince!" Nikomedes gasped, scuttling over to the wounded Vampyrum. "Did I hurt you?"

"My wing's a little sore," Amis answered dismissively, still trying to right himself. "But I'll be fine."

"Why ever did you interrupt me?" the priest asked, visibly troubled. "That was to be the final sacrifice! We were to raise Zotz!"

"We make no more sacrifices," Amis ordered him, breathing heavily still. "Not now…and not ever."

"But I don't understand, we—"

"No, listen to me!" he said forcefully. "You see my father's body over there. He's gone. You know what that means. I am King now. I am King, and I say no more sacrifices."

The priest closed his mouth very slowly, looking at him with an oddly calculating expression.

"I understand," he said slowly after a while, walking towards Amis. "But why this rash decision?"

"Because," Amis continued between breaths, "they're bats, just like us. We're both the same creature. We shouldn't be hurting one another like this—we should be allies."

"I see," Nikomedes nodded, still shuffling towards him. His eyes never once left his face.

"From now on, we don't eat bat meat. It's not right. And we don't take prisoners either. We…" He faltered as the priest began to get very close now, nodding and grunting his agreement the whole while. For whatever reason, Amis didn't care for the expression on his face. "What are you doing?" he demanded, angered by how scared his voice sounded as the prince soon found himself no more than a wingspan from the priest.

"I have devoted my whole life to serving Zotz," Nikomedes began quietly, his eyes shifting troublingly to the side as though he couldn't bring himself to look Amis in the eye any longer. "It takes many years to learn the stars and read the signs like I have."

There was a strange glow in his eyes, and he was still getting closer, raising his claws in front of him to gesticulate. Yet, with each movement, they seemed slowly rise higher and higher above him.

"What are you doing?" Amis asked, though this time with even less force.

"You were like a son to me, you know, Amis," the priest said wistfully, finally looking at him again. His expression was almost fatherly. "I watched you learn and grow, and it made me proud to raise you. And now, I look at you here, lying on the ground, one sacrifice from victory, and I know what must be done. I know what is asked of me. I take no pleasure in what I'm about to do," he said sadly, raising his claws further. "But I must act as Zotz demands. I hope you will understand."

Amis tried to move, painfully aware of how vulnerable he was, but each shift in his wing sent strong jolts of pain throughout his entire body. The priest was frightening him terribly with his regretful demeanor and he had no desire to discover where his actions where leading.

Amis lay there helplessly, staring into the eyes of the bat that had raised him from a newborn, caring for him ever since he was old enough to hunt on his own. The priest's claws were raised high now, and a crazed expression had taken over his eyes—he was ready to do anything to raise Zotz. Were his kind all the same?

He looked over at the Graywing desolately, and just hoped that whatever happened next, she would be safe.

"Goodbye, Amis," Nikomedes finished somberly, his claws above his head.

Amis closed his eyes, bracing for the impact. He just wished it would be quick.

It seemed to take forever to come, but the blow finally hit him hard and he recoiled in pain as his injured wing was pressed agonizingly against the floor. He yelled out in surprise, waiting for the piercing pain of the priest's claws in his chest. However, it never came—no sharp pain, no point of a claw digging into him. Instead, he felt only a firm but dull weight pressing against him, pinning him to the floor.

He opened his eyes curiously and saw that the priest had collapsed onto him, his arms still raised. For a moment, Amis thought the bat was dead, but he could smell his rancid breath as he stared into Nikomedes's unconscious face. He looked around, trying to deduce what had downed the priest so conveniently. He didn't need to search long.

There, resting right on the floor where Nikomedes had stood just moments ago, was a lone, silver-furred bat. Though he appeared strong for his size, he was still much smaller than the average Vampyrum, and Amis was shocked that he had managed to take the priest out so easily.

"Are you alright?" the bat asked concernedly.

"I…I think so," Amis stammered. He never would've expected a northern bat to ask him such a question—like he actually cared about his well-being.

"I just figured it'd be a shame to see the one good member of your species go to waste," the bat said with a smile. "I guess if owls can turn out alright, you guys can too."

"Thanks," Amis replied, still somewhat disheveled as he shoved the priest's unconscious body off of him.

He took a few fresh, deep breaths, staring intriguingly at the bat before him. His face was handsomely chiseled and his chest hinted at his agility in flight. He was probably considered quite strong for a northern bat. Currently, he was grinning down at Amis good-naturedly. It was the kind of smile he feared no Vampyrum was capable of, and he wondered what it was like to be able to laugh at such a time.

The Silverwing's smile faded quickly, however, as his eyes fell to the limp body of the strangely-furred bat lying behind him. With a sharp gasp, he flew over to its side, looking down at it anxiously. It was strange for Amis to see another bat express remorse like this, for he had never known a Vampyrum to wear such an expression. Was it normal for all northern bats to feel this sympathetic towards a lost comrade? The bat looked deeply troubled.

"He's alive," Amis offered, trying to be helpful in return to his saviour.

The bat didn't look up, taking in his friend's wounds and bloodied appearance.

"I saw that he was still breathing," Amis explained. "It seems like he managed to kill my dear father, anyway," he added with a quick, nervous laugh. He wasn't quite comfortable yet, being around someone he had always been told was his enemy—or his food. He wasn't exactly sure how to act.

Eventually, when the bat didn't return his chuckle, something in his expression resonated with Amis.

"You know him?" Amis asked.

The bat nodded sadly. "And I knew her too," he said, turning his gaze to the Brightwing, lying off to his side a little ways.

"I'm sorry…" Amis trailed off, not knowing the bat's name.

"Chinook," he answered with a grim nod.

"Amis," he replied. "I'm sorry. It's hard for me to think that I could've saved her if I'd…if I'd seen everything for what it was sooner."

"It's okay," Chinook said softly. "It's better for her this way. Her son is the one I'm really worried about." He flicked his head at the still-breathing bat next to him, muttering now in his sleep.

Amis couldn't think of anything else to say, new as he was to the idea of sorrow, but was spared the effort as a Vampyrum guard came rushing into the room, nearly crashing into the ground in shock as the bizarre scene painted itself before him.

"P-Prince Amis…" he started haltingly, clearly at a loss for words. "I…there's an enemy there!" he yelled, pointing at Chinook. That was seemingly the only concrete thing he could grasp at the moment.

"He is not our enemy," Amis said evenly, though he could tell that his words would likely be lost on the bat given his current state. "Why are you here?"

"King…King Goth sent me to check that there were no more prisoners," he explained, looking sickly as his eyes passed over the deceased Vampyrum's body.

"King Goth is dead," Amis said plainly, not even trying to feign grief. "I am King now."

"Yes…yes sir," he nodded, evidently not any closer to comprehension than he had been when he had arrived.

"Much has happened," Amis said calmly as the bat looked ready to rip out his own fur, "but there is no time to waste with an explanation. Send out the word to the soldiers to stand down. We will not fight our own brothers and sisters any longer." The bat continued to look puzzled and Amis felt himself losing his patience. "Quickly now! Before more lives are lost!"

The guard nodded, and with a last appalled glance at the bloodied floor of the chamber, he set out to do as he was bidden. Exhausted silence fell over the room as Chinook tended to his injured friend.

"I think it's safe for me to take him," he said finally. "I can carry him back to his grandparents. I'll be able to tell the elders that it's over now."

With a final nod, the Silverwing left Amis to himself. As the stars above faded back to their normal size and the sun peeked back out from behind its veil, Amis could focus only on one thing.

Exhausted as he was from everything that had happened, he scuttled over painfully but resolutely to the Graywing still lying on the floor, hastily inspecting her injuries. She had suffered no worse than a mild concussion, he concluded with relief, hardly even a scratch on her small body. She would likely wake up in a matter of minutes.

"Chryseis," he whispered fondly to deaf ears.

He knew no better than she did what lay in store for the small bat. His thoughts were rushing ahead to all manner of wild ideas, but he knew it was near hopeless speculation. He would more likely raise Zotz into the Upper World than ever fulfill his desires, as he knew well enough. Still, one thing was for certain: this small bat had unwittingly changed the fate of the entire world, and all that lay beyond it.


	13. Chapter 13: Dawn

**Chapter 13: Dawn**

He woke with a start, imagining that he was still inside the Vampyrum temple, that the battle was still raging on. Everything came rushing back to him with startling speed and he sat bolt upright in fear, hastily trying to take in his surroundings. No sooner had he opened his eyes than he was snatched up into a tight, chocking hold, pressing the air out of him. He gave a shout, writhing and struggling for a moment, thinking that Goth was still alive, or that the priest had gone after him; thinking that he was about to die.

Then, whatever was holding him lessened its grip slightly, and he paused, suddenly aware that his attacker was much smaller than a Vampyrum—and its fur was softer too. In fact, the bat smelled familiar, like…

"Luna?" he asked cautiously.

She laughed. "Relax, Griff! It's just me!"

Without a moment's hesitation, he pulled her back into his chest with his wings, restoring the suffocating embrace. It was amazing how quickly such a simple act could melt away all of his anxiety. He caught himself poking her with his nose, checking that it was really her and that she wasn't injured, all the while intoxicating himself with her warm scent. She was alive! He was alive! The world hadn't ended!

"I thought you were dead!" she cried into his shoulder, choking up slightly.

"I thought _you_ were dead!" he echoed back. They were laughing and crying and nothing else really made sense to him at the moment—but nothing else seemed to matter anyway.

"You're so beaten up!" she said finally, pulling back and looking at him worriedly. "Does it hurt?"

He shook his head, grinning wildly. "Not anymore."

He took the opportunity to look around him, and saw that he was lying on some kind of thick branch, healing paste spread all over his body. They were in the middle of the jungle, nothing seemingly significant about the spot, but he was having difficulty taking in his surroundings. His eyes were squinting slightly as he glanced around him, making it impossible to see clearly as he winced against the glare of the sun.

The sun! It was back!

"You had us worried there for a second, you know," a new voice called to him from above.

As his eyes finally adjusted to the light, he only just realized that the surrounding branches were filled with other bats, all looking down at him fondly. He could see Lucretia, a little battered but otherwise healthy; Ariel, smiling despite the large chunk missing from her ear and the several gashes across her chest; Chinook, looking extremely relieved that he was awake; and even the owl, Orestes, also a little worse for the wear but still smiling in that weird, bird-like way. As his eyes passed over them all, his gaze finally fell back down to the branch, coming to rest beside him where another bat that lay, his wings spread out. He, too, had healing potions spread over a horrendous number of gaping wounds in his membrane and torso.

"Cassiel?" he asked softly, almost afraid to rouse him. He was terribly worried for his grandfather, the image of the unmoving bat and the thick paste far too similar to Luna's, all those years ago.

"He's okay," Luna said brightly. "Just resting a little, like you."

"There are so many of you," Griffin breathed, feeling a little nervous.

"There would have been more, but we decided that you needed to relax right now," Ariel said kindly. "You're quite the hero, you know."

"I am?"

"Of course you are," she chuckled. "You killed Goth. That's no small feat."

Griffin frowned slightly, thinking back to the sacrifice room.

"I didn't kill Goth…" he said slowly.

"But Chinook saw the body," Luna cut in.

"But I didn't do it," Griffin repeated, trying to remember what had happened. He drew his hand to his stomach, as though feeling for a hole that he knew should have been there. "He had me," he said quietly. "He stabbed me straight through!"

"Well, he couldn't have, Griff," Luna said, frowning slightly. "I mean, you're perfectly fine. You must've—"

"No," he persisted. "Goth had me! He stabbed me right through here," he said, pointing at his torso. "I could feel his claw in me—I thought I was dead. And then something weird happened. He sort of…collapsed…and when I looked, there wasn't even a mark on me…but he was bleeding really badly…"

"But Griffin, that's impossible," Luna said kindly. "If he stabbed you, why didn't you die?"

"I don't know…" Griffin trailed off into silence for a while. Why _wasn't_ he dead? Not that he was complaining—he was perfectly happy to have survived—but he still wished he understood what had happened.

"I know what happened," Lucretia said eventually.

"You do?" Griffin asked, perplexed.

The elder nodded. "I do. You say that Goth struck you with his claw?"

"Yeah…"

"And it was a fatal hit? It should have killed you?"

Griffin nodded, unsure where this was going.

"Then the answer is simple: you _did _die," she finished with a nod.

"But—"

"Listen. When you came back from the Underworld, you didn't return with your own life, did you?"

Griffin shook his head, "No, it was—"

"It was Shade's," Lucretia nodded. "So when Goth attacked you, he didn't kill you, he killed Shade."

He stared up at her, considering this for a moment. "I still don't under—"

"Think, Griffin," the elder pressed on. "Your life was not your own. Who had your life?"

Griffin thought for a moment, still severely confused. His life wasn't his own…but what did that matter? He was still able to move and breathe, wasn't he?

As he sat, trying to puzzle things out, Luna's face erupted into a look of sudden comprehension.

"Of course!" she exclaimed, looking down at him again. "Goth had your life, Griffin!"

"Exactly," Lucretia said encouragingly. "So when you died, Griffin, it was really your father's life that was destroyed. Your body became nothing but an empty shell in need of something to fill it. And so, when Goth's claw was driven through you, the life that resided in him flowed out of his body and into yours. It sought to reunite with its original owner: you. Which left Goth…"

"Which left Goth dead!" Griffin said, finally understanding. Goth's life wasn't rightfully his, so it came back to Griffin when he needed it—after all, Goth's claw was already deep inside of his torso. It wasn't exactly a long trip!

"But how do you know all this?" he found himself asking. He could tell from the dumbfounded expression on the others' faces that he was not the only one surprised by Lucretia's wisdom.

"Well, I may not be Frieda," she defended herself with a wry smile, "but I wasn't made chief elder for nothing."

They all laughed in the same sort of heavily relieved way before Griffin felt himself tire again. His body hadn't quite caught up with him yet as he relaxed his head back against the bark of the tree branch, thinking. Did this mean Goth was truly gone now? Was he finally, irreversibly dead? It was almost too good to be true…

He bolted upright again, his exhausted mind suddenly remembering something.

"The priest!" Griffin cried out. "He was going to finish the sacrifices! We have to stop him! He—"

"It's okay, Griffin," Chinook said soothingly. "The priest never finished."

"He didn't? But who stopped him? I was—"

Chinook smiled. "His own son stopped him."

"Goth's _son_?" he asked, staring dumbstruck at the bat for a moment. He hadn't even known that Goth had a son. It was impossible to comprehend that any bat would ever want to mate with such a monster; and even then, why would a _Vampyrum_ stop the sacrifices? Didn't they all _want_ Zotz to rise and kill the sun?

Seeing the expression on his face, Chinook elaborated patiently.

"I know it's hard to believe, but I saw Amis do it. He pushed a Graywing right out from under the priest's claws—and he almost got himself killed doing it too. He stopped the last sacrifice, and Zotz never rose. He was the one who told all of the soldiers to stand down. It's over, thanks to him," he finished with a smile.

"But why did he tell them to stop?" Griffin asked, feeling thoroughly unconvinced.

Chinook looked thoughtful, a strange glint of understanding in his eyes. "I don't know," he started slowly, "but Amis really does seem different. I mean, until we met Orestes, we always thought all of the owls were evil too, right?"

"I guess so…" Griffin agreed reluctantly, looking over at the owl Prince as he stared down at him benevolently.

"And he seems to really care for that Graywing he saved," Chinook continued. "All I know is that it's finished now."

"We can go home, Griff!" Luna cried, squeezing the air out of him again.

He smiled warmly. Home. How good it would be to get back to Tree Haven, to sleep in his old roost, to have his mother beside him…

Suddenly, he felt as though he had just been punched in the gut.

His mother. She wouldn't be there anymore. She wouldn't hold him, or nuzzle him, or fall back to check on him ever again. She was gone, and she wasn't coming back. It made the whole world seem so empty to him now, both of his parents gone. How could he ever feel the same about his home again, knowing that she wouldn't be there?

He felt his eyes burning hotly, and didn't even try to hold his tears back. He had forced himself to stay focused and detached when he was fighting Goth, but there was nothing to distract him anymore, and it all came pouring out.

"Griff?" Luna asked concernedly as he began to cry in earnest. "What's the matter? We're going home!"

"Mom…" he whispered quietly.

"Oh…"

She looked down at her claws awkwardly and the rest of his company followed suit, bowing their heads in respect. He gathered that Chinook must've told them what had happened, and was glad that he wouldn't have to repeat the story to the others. Every single one of them, he realized, had known his mother in one way or another; they all missed her.

"I can't believe she's gone too," he said suddenly, speaking between his sobs. How could he have felt so happy only a moment ago?

Sighing sadly, Ariel dropped down from her roost, landing beside him gently. She gave him a quick nuzzle and look into his eyes seriously. "She knew what she was getting herself into, Griffin," she said softly. "Everyone did. She died fighting for what she believed in."

"Besides," Luna added, pulling in close as well and pressing against him soothingly. "She's not really gone, Griffin; you know that."

He smiled weakly and nodded, remembering the afterlife. It sickened him to think that his mother would have to go through that hellish Underworld before she would finally be where she belonged.

"I just hope she finds the Tree," he said finally.

"She will," Ariel told him kindly. "She's a smart bat."

Griffin nodded again, feeling a little better with Luna beside him once more. He just lay there the whole day, crying into Luna's chest for while until he finally calmed down. He would pull through with her help, he knew, it was just a matter of time.

The day drew on, and he began to grow tired of the crowd that had quickly formed around him—asking questions and wanting to meet the bat that had saved them all. He wasn't sure he deserved their praise, but he welcomed it all the same.

Eventually, as the sky darkened into night again, he stared up at the stars with his bleary eyes—all back to their normal size now. Nocturna had helped them that day, he knew; there was no doubt about it. Without her watching over them, not a single of their number would've survived. Now, he hoped she would guide the bats that had given their lives that day on their last, long journey—his mother among them.

As these thoughts swirled through his head, he saw one, very bright star twinkle briefly against the black of the sky. It was almost as though some great being was winking at him reassuringly, and it was on that promising note that he felt himself drift back off to sleep.


	14. Chapter 14: The Mine

**Chapter 14: The Mine**

Shade was waiting, watching. He had no body to really give him a firm grasp of where he was, but he hovered ambiguously nonetheless, staring intently at a lone spot on the ground. As he waited, he became conscious of thousands of other souls around him, patiently lingering nearby with a vaguely expectant air, but they were invisible as always. They were all here for the same reason, he knew, and so they waited together.

Glancing away for a moment, he could see the dense forest that surrounded his point of interest. It was really no different than any other forest: the branches were all bare, the leaves buried beneath a foot of snow; the air was cold and bitter, though how he knew this was beyond him. It was an entirely unspectacular location—for now at least.

The appearance of the spot was irrelevant, however. Something was about to happen—he knew it was, he just knew. As much as he wanted to celebrate, as much as he wanted to enjoy the fact that his son was alive and well and Goth was dead once more, he knew that it was far from over. So, he stared at the small, precise point on the snow-covered ground—certain beyond a doubt that the others were all awaiting the same thing—and he wondered what it would mean for the world. He wondered what it would mean for them all.

The ground seemed to tremble as he stared, and he watched more closely still, wondering if he had imagined it. Again, the ground shook, stronger this time—then another tremor.

_It's happening_, he thought dreadfully.

Slowly, much more slowly than he had expected, a miniscule hole appeared where there had only previously been earth. A very faint, whistling hiss exhaled through the gap as it birthed a network of smaller cracks, splitting open further.

They had done it, he thought grimly. Zotz's miners had broken through.

As though building on its momentum, the ground quickly collapsed around the opening, dilating the hole to several times its original size—large enough for a bat to fit through.

Sure enough, Shade saw a flared nose poke its way out from beneath the earth, tentatively sniffing at the air. With a cold tingle down his spine, he knew what would come next. It would climb out first, then more would follow it; the hole would get wider and deeper, expanding until it consumed everything in sight; and eventually…

But he was wrong. The bat had a hard time clawing itself up onto land, struggling and fighting desperately against the air rushing past it, but its efforts were fruitless. It dragged itself out a little ways, only to be sucked back into the Underworld as a terrible voice rang out in triumph. Shade knew the owner of that voice all too well.

"Free," Zotz said slowly, drawing as much relish from the word as he could, "at last…"

Shade was truly frightened now. He had hoped in vain that this day would never come—especially not so soon. His son had only just defeated Goth, and now Zotz had broken through into the Upper World. It was only a matter of time before he consumed the entire world of the living—only a matter of time before he destroyed everything Nocturna had wrought.

As Shade began to worry about the fate of his family, something happened that caught him off guard—something he never would have believed had he not witnessed it himself.

The hole exploded.

Not imploded—not collapsing inward on itself and sucking every living creature into the Underworld's depths—no. It exploded: it tripled in size, ejecting a terrible rush of wind; and in the upheaval of rock and debris, thousands—no, millions—millions and millions of dead bats were thrust into the world of the living, mingling with the debris, and the…

The sound! Shade gasped. Thousands upon thousands of shards of sound also burst into the Upper World—small fragments of the world Zotz had spun below, he realized. They burst forward in tandem with the torrent of wings and bodies flying through the opening, but neither the fragments nor the bats seemed to be doing so of their own free will. They were being pushed along by a powerful current of air, which sounded eerily like a terrible moan.

It _was_ a moan, Shade realized.

"No!" Zotz yelled. "What is this? This is not what was supposed to happen!"

_His kingdom is collapsing!_ Shade realized stunningly, _it's tearing itself to shreds!_ The air and sound was breaking lose, the billions and billions of souls Zotz had enslaved were bursting through the opening of the mine and being unwittingly cast into Nocturna's afterlife. Zotz didn't seem to have any power over them anymore, for even as he watched the display before him, Shade noticed that the hole was diminishing. It had already shrunk to hardly his old wingspan in width!

Despite its reduced size, bats continued to stream from the mine, pushed along hard by the terrible current. He saw Vampyrum, and Brightwings, and Foxwings, and Freetails, and hundreds of species of bat he had never even known before. Nocturna was fulfilling her promise!

Finally, as the last of the dead made its way through the tiny pinprick of a hole, Zotz gave a final mournful cry, his kingdom in ruins. He had unknowingly brought about his own defeat, entombing himself alone in his own prison.

The forest grew silent again, and in the ensuing peace, Shade felt confident that Zotz was finally locked in his world for good, never to harm another bat. He even caught himself feeling a little sorry for the misguided god who had let his good intentions transform him into such a monster, and he shook his head pityingly.

Wait, he had a head?

He frowned in confusion and nearly felt his heart stop to discover that he had a mouth too—wait, his _heart_?

Looking down at himself, he realized that he had more than a head and a face. He could see a torso too—fur, arms, legs, wings, veins—everything. He had a body again!

It was a bizarre feeling now, he had to admit. He had gotten so used to being…well, whatever formless spirit had had been before that he wasn't quite sure he really enjoyed having his runty body back—so small and weak. He couldn't decide what it meant either.

However, he wasn't the only one baffled by this turn in events, it seemed. The other spirits he had felt around him earlier were also looking down at themselves curiously, seeming deeply troubled. Some of them must have been dead for thousands of years, he realized—did they even remember what it was like to have a body?

He wondered excitedly if this meant he was alive again. It seemed unlikely, but he felt it was worth a shot. Tentatively, he flew over, slightly clumsy after so long without a body, and tried to set down on a branch. He felt himself slip as his feet made to grip the bark: his claws went straight through, as though they were nothing but a sound illusion. Still, he wasn't disappointed: he hadn't really expected billions of dead bats to be spontaneously resurrected. He was happy enough to have a form again, and to know that the living were safe from Zotz forevermore.

All throughout the forest now, this inconceivable mass of newly freed bats was churning and rolling listlessly, as though none of them had the slightest clue what to do next. Shade counted himself among them.

Suddenly, as though reading his mind, a soft female voice rang out across the woods.

"You are free now," Nocturna said, as a strange, glowing mist formed against the horizon. "You are ready for the next step in your journey."

The voice was so gentle and so warm that Shade saw countless bats fly off towards the horizon immediately, flapping their new wings excitedly as they moved on to whatever Nocturna had awaiting them. Vampyrum and northern bats and other exotic species alike slowly departed towards the strange mist glowing to the west, heading away from their bleak deaths.

To the east, a similar mist formed against the sky, releasing a small but steady trickle of bats as they followed the others to their new lives. They seemed less confident in their path than the others, as though this was all new to them, and Shade understood that they must be the recently deceased. It relieved him to know that they no longer needed to travel through Zotz's terrible Underworld, and he wondered how long a journey it was for them towards the westerly horizon, forever beckoning.

Slowly but surely, the vast crowd of billions thinned until only the small stream of fresh arrivals remained, passing him by with only a slight glance. Some looked worried, others looked relaxed, some even seemed to think they recognized him, but none ever stopped.

Shade felt compelled to go with them, and he knew he would one day, but he forced himself to stay behind for now. He had some unfinished business to tend to.


	15. Chapter 15: Peace

**Chapter 15: Peace**

Amis hung from his favourite roost atop the great pyramid, looking out over his inherited kingdom with pride. The sun shone brightly in the sky, illuminating the jungle with its warm glow, and he felt glad that it was still around to enhance the beauty of the scene before him. Newborns were fighting one another playfully, their parents were grooming each other, the older bats were talking leisurely about trivial things, and it all seemed so inexplicably peaceful.

He could also see a few Vampyrum soaring in and out of the foliage stealthily—hunting it seemed—and he heard a few shrieks too, for that matter. After all, they still hunted live pray—rodents, birds, other smaller animals—but not once since he had ascended to the throne had he ever heard the cry of an injured northern bat as it was killed and eaten by one of his kind. So long as he was king, bats were off the menu.

After all, he thought as he glanced over at the Graywing curled under his wing beside him, it wouldn't be respectful to their queen.

Admittedly, there had been some foreseeable difficulties in their relationship. When she had finally awoken all those days ago, and despite his best efforts, she had fled the temple immediately, not giving him even the slightest backward glance. Crushed as he had been, he couldn't say her reaction had surprised him.

Even after the other bats had told her that he was friendly, it was only reluctantly that she came to speak with him. She had wanted to thank him formally for saving her life, and all of the other associated things, but he had hoped for much more. The whole thing had been a very halting, awkward conversation, and he remembered feeling thoroughly put out at how quickly everything was going to end. Then, he had surprised himself.

He had confessed to her—cleanly and plainly. He had simply told her everything—everything he had thought since he had first asked for her name. He really hadn't thought that it would work, but he had been desperate.

Somehow, things had improved after that, and slowly, they had seen each other more often. The formalities were dropped, and they even became good friends—at least, as good a friend as he had ever known. Eventually, just as the northerners were getting ready to leave, she had agreed to stay.

He was jerked suddenly from his reverie as the small Graywing roused herself a little and opened her eyes. She looked up at him groggily and nearly jumped out of her fur.

"Amis!" she yelled breathlessly, clasping at her chest in shock. "You have no idea how scary it is to wake up to those teeth every night," she moaned closing her eyes again.

"I'm sorry," he said with a grin. "I was just enjoying the view, and I couldn't help remembering that it only still exists because of you."

"I'm a hero," she said quietly, nuzzling up against him and drifting back off to sleep.

He still wasn't sure exactly what it was that had drawn him to her so much—some strange connection he had felt ever since they had first stared into each other's eyes. Granted, in that instance the circumstances had been very different, but the bond was there nonetheless.

As he pulled Chryseis in tight against him once more, he realized that he had been wrong that fateful day: something good _had_ come of looking into the cell.

* * *

><p>Zephyr smiled to himself. He had been smiling for quite a few nights straight by this point, and he simply couldn't stop.<p>

He couldn't have hoped for a better ending to everything. Admittedly, there had been many deaths, and the rat kingdom especially was still recovering from its decimation, but everyone was finally at peace. The Humans were changing their ways, the owls had long since stopped persecuting the bats, and the Vampyrum had finally added their hand to the mix as they turned their backs on their vengeful god and his tyrannical ways. For the first time in thousands of years, all of the bats were comrades once again.

He was also glad that Griffin had retained his faith in Nocturna, even when his parents began to have doubts, for she had been a greater part of the bats' quest for freedom than any of them could possibly know. She had driven Cassiel to seek the meaning of the bands, inspired Shade to glance at the sun, blown him off course to Marina's island, guided Goth into the hands of the Man, ensured that Orestes was in the same Human building as the Silverwings, everything—even giving Griffin the idea to steal the fire so that he would ultimately be sucked into the Underworld. The colony would never be able to fully appreciate the role she had played in their lives, and it was best, he decided, that it stayed that way.

Feeling at peace with himself now, the old albino closed his eyes and his ears forever. He was ready to join the god that had given him his power, and his responsibility. His time had come; his work was finished.

* * *

><p>Griffin hung beside Luna on a stiff, wet branch, waiting solemnly. Spring had finally arrived, and Tree Haven was now experiencing its first rainfall of the year. It was all too perfect for the occasion, Griffin felt as the small drops fell sporadically from the sky. It was like Nocturna herself was mourning.<p>

The forest was filled beyond recognition, every tree sagging visibly under the weight of its occupants: birds, bats, owls, rats—even wolves, littering the ground. Thousands had shown to pay their respects, and as nice as the gesture was, Griffin almost wished that it could be just him and Luna.

"Thank you all for coming," Ariel's voice rang out somewhere above him. "We have had much to celebrate in the past few weeks, but much to mourn as well. Countless of our friends and family and brave allies were lost in the battle to defeat Zotz last winter, and each of them deserves fair recognition. But today, we are here to honor two bats in particular—two bats who selflessly sacrificed their lives for the greater cause…."

Her speech went on for some time, and it was really very touching to Griffin. It made him feel like they weren't truly gone, talking about them like this, but he knew all too well that they wouldn't be coming back.

After Ariel had done her part, Cassiel took her place. It had been decided a long time ago that they would be the ones to speak, for they knew Shade and Marina best—at least, except for each other.

Griffin had been asked to speak as well, but he simply couldn't do it. He held up pretty well most of the time, but whenever he heard their names being mentioned, he was reminded of just how much he missed them. He could hardly speak confidently at the best of times, and the last thing he wanted was to screw everything up.

Eventually, Cassiel finished too, and the entire forest bowed its head respectfully as two maple leaves were carried across the clearing before them. Each was held gently in the claws of four, very somber males, soaring gracefully towards Tree Haven's base. On one leaf, his mother's bright body lay peacefully beneath a few blades of grass, thrown over her to hide the gaping wound in her chest. Beside her, the second leaf held only a small stone, lying in place of his father, whose body could never be recovered from the Underworld.

The leaves were lowered carefully into two, neatly dug graves, resting side by side symbolically, and Griffin felt tears come to his eyes again as the holes were filled with earth. As a final gesture, intricate markings were carved in the soft bark of Tree Haven above them, commemorating the spot for as long as it stood.

"Will you be okay?" Luna asked him quietly after a while.

"I wish they were still here," he sighed, a small lump in his throat.

She nodded, pressing in against him gently. "At least they're together now."

* * *

><p>Shade stared off into the horizon, noting that it was strangely clear of the several bats that usually dotted the glowing mist. Squinting slightly, his eyes focused on a single, small, inscrutable speck set against the rising sun, and somehow he knew that it was finally her.<p>

He waited patiently for her to come, not wanting to rush things. It might have been days, it might have been years, it might only have been a few minutes, but he waited all the same. Slowly but surely, the dot grew larger, eventually shaping into a face, then a pair of elegant wings and a body of bright fur. Soon, he could see the shell-like ears and the small, pointed nose, and it took all of his resolve not to fly to her at once. She would come; he needed to be patient.

He couldn't help smiling as she finally pulled up beside him and stopped, neither needing to beat their wings to stay aloft. Sometimes death had its advantages.

"You're a bat," Shade said with a smile, unable to restrain himself.

"You're a genius," Marina replied, grinning wildly.

Without any further delay, they jumped into each other's wings, laughing and crying and shaking shamelessly, feeling completely happy for the first time in years. He had missed her so terribly, always able to see and hear her but never able to say anything back. Now, she was here beside him yet again, and he couldn't have imagined feeling this good ever before.

They could have stayed in that tight embrace forever—never growing hungry, never growing thirsty, and certainly never growing tired. Ultimately, however, Marina did pull back, looking at her mate apologetically.

"Shade," she started regretfully. "About that time with Chinook…"

"It's okay," he said softly.

"Did it bother you?" she asked concernedly.

"A little," he admitted, shrugging, "at first. But I knew you never would've done anything too stupid. After all," he added with a smile, "that's my job."

"I'm sorry I made fun of you so much," she said sadly, pulling him close to her again. "I really do love you. You know that, right?"

He nodded. "Of course I do. You just have a weird way of showing it. That's kind of the point: I'm weird, you're weird…"

She chuckled a little. "Well, I don't know if _I'm_ weird…"

He just laughed in spite of himself. Had he really expected anything less?

"So where do we go now?" she asked brightly, shedding her guilt and becoming herself again.

"Over to that horizon," he said pointing to the west.

"Then where?"

"I haven't the slightest clue."

"We're not going to get lost again, are we?" she taunted.

He nudged her with his wing and she laughed again before they set out towards the glowing mist. Inevitably, they didn't make it far before they started arguing about what the next life would be like, and that just made things all the better for both of them. Eventually, the two bats faded into the foggy horizon and off onto their next great adventure.

* * *

><p>Moa sprawled herself out in the sun, enjoying the warm spring air against her bruised body after all those humid nights in the Jungle. Feeling tired, she forced herself to keep one lazy eye open, watching fondly as her two cubs fought and played with each other, frolicking in the budding grass.<p>

It was a relief to finally relax now. Her face still bore scratches from the battle down south, and she had felt certain that she would never fully clean her muzzle of all of the bat blood spattered against it, but now it was all over. She could finally settle down.

As the sun began to droop low in the sky and a peaceful calm descended on the mountain forest, her children began to grow weary of their fighting, lying down exhaustedly in the grass. She walked over and lay beside them warily, resting her head on her paws and trying to finally drift off to sleep. The image of her son, writhing and struggling as he was dragged away, had never fully left her mind; but thankfully, the vines had since remained dormant, never to claim one of her cubs again.


	16. Chapter 16: Celeste

**Chapter 16: Celeste**

"I've got you now," she muttered, closing in on her prey.

She soared through the night, a silver blur as the moonlight glinted off of the bright streak running down her back. She moved in ever-closer to her target, readying herself to strike. Just as she moved in to catch it, the Tiger Moth exploded into a sea of sound illusions, leaving her thoroughly confused. She felt herself fall back a little from the mass of insects as she faltered, her echo-vision flitting from one copy to another. Which one was real?

She shook her head to sober herself and began hunting the moth with her eyes. She wasn't going to give up this easily—not this time.

"Your little sound tricks aren't going to work on me," she told it determinedly, pulling up over top of it and batting it into her claw with her tail. "Gotcha!"

She tossed the still-flapping insect into her mouth and bit down on her prize, savouring in its taste—the taste of victory. It went down her throat and she felt tremendously satisfied in herself. Everyone knew how hard it was to catch a Tiger Moth.

Her hunger sated, she decided that she had eaten enough. She knew she should've kept hunting—her mother never stopped reminding her to fatten up for the migration ahead—but she felt too exhausted by her latest efforts to force it any longer. Instead, she made her way over to a small maple tree to roost, where a pair of other newborns seemed to be arguing animatedly with each other.

"What're you guys talking about?" she asked, setting down beside them.

The closest bat turned to her for support, and Celeste recognized her as Andromeda. "Nero keeps saying that _Griffin _was the one that got tied up in the cactus in the Underworld!" she said scathingly.

"That's what happened!" the other newborn protested—Nero, she presumed. "My mother told me the whole story! Griffin got trapped in these vines that were possessed by Zotz, and Luna had to save him!"

"That's not what happened!" Andromeda spat back. "It was the other way around: Griffin saved Luna!"

"That's not what my mother said!"

"Yeah, because Skye is _so_ knowledgeable," she scoffed sarcastically.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"What do you think it means?"

Celeste heaved a weary sigh and took off again without a word, leaving the two alone to bicker to their heart's content.

Of course they were talking about her parents—that's all anyone ever talked about around Tree Haven. There was never anything else interesting going on.

It wasn't that she didn't understand their fascination: her parents were both practically heroes, and her father was the colony's greatest living idol—saving the sun and defeating the notorious Vampyrum king, Goth. It was perfectly reasonable to be interested in their stories.

No, what really bothered her was that it left no room for anything else, and what was worse was that the other newborns always seemed to forget that she knew all of the stories too—far better than any of them for that matter. After all, she had heard them first hand from her mother, who had actually lived through them.

Ultimately, it seemed that if bats weren't talking about her father, they were talking about her mother; or if they weren't talking about her mother, they were talking about her grandfather, Shade, or her grandmother Marina. Even her great-grandparents were fairly famous, and both were well-known elders. What hope did she have of living up to _any_ of them? What hope did she have even going one day without answering a question about one of them?

She remembered now how excited she had been to tell some of the other newborns her story with the Tiger Moth, but somehow it no longer felt very extraordinary. It was just a stupid moth. Griffin probably would've caught five; Shade would've caught the entire forest. She was just an average bat with no special talent that was easily forgotten.

As she fluttered through the air, fuming silently, she became so caught up in her thoughts that she wasn't paying any attention to where she was going, and without warning, she felt her body smack into something hard. Whatever it was, it was much heavier than a bug.

"Ow!" she yelled, righting herself and grasping at her head with her foreclaw, her grunt echoed by another voice. She looked up and saw that she had hit another bat, who was also rubbing his head sorely.

"I'm sorry," she apologized. "Did I hurt you?"

"Ow. No…no, I'm okay," he insisted, his voice a little weak.

"Are you sure?" she asked concernedly. "I hit you pretty hard. Maybe you should roost somewhere for a while."

He nodded, not looking entirely well, and she escorted him over to a tall sugar maple tree. She noticed distractedly that it was teeming with caterpillars, making it difficult to find a clean place to land. Never in her life had she seen so many caterpillars on one tree. There were probably more of them than leaves.

She eventually set down and waited patiently for her companion as he approached the tree after her. It took him a couple of tries to land successfully before he finally roosted beside her and folded himself up in his wings.

"So…" she began awkwardly, watching the bat rub his forehead some more. She looked down as his grimacing face, checking to see if she recognized him. He was another newborn like her, but she couldn't remember having ever seen him before. Then again, there were a lot of newborns, and it was hard to really keep track of who was who.

"You really did hit me pretty good," he said in spite of himself.

She chuckled uncomfortably. "Yeah, sorry about that. I got a bit distracted. I didn't even see you…" She trailed of embarrassingly, hoping he wasn't angry.

"What made you so distracted that you didn't see another _bat_?" he asked, frowning as he brought his claw down before his eyes. There was a little bit of blood on it.

She sighed heavily. "Oh, just…things…"

"What kind of things?" he asked curiously.

She stared at him hesitantly, wondering if she should say. Something inside her really wanted to tell him—to finally tell _someone_—but she wasn't sure how he would take it.

"It's okay if you don't want to tell me," he said quickly. "I didn't mean to—"

"I just don't get why all of the other newborns are so obsessed with Griffin!" she blurted suddenly, "and Luna, and Shade, and Marina, and everyone else! They never talk about anything that's happening _right now_! It's always arguments over what did or didn't happen, and who did or didn't do what, and whether Shade killed a million cannibals or a billion cannibals, and…" She took a breath, seething. "And if you try to talk about anything else, they just ignore you!"

She stopped finally, feeling relieved that she had finally let it out. Her voice had risen steadily and her flanks were heaving. She wondered suddenly if she had scared the other bat a little—he was looking at her somewhat strangely.

"Well," he reasoned finally, "they _are_ pretty amazing stories."

"Oh, I know they are," she said irritably. "I've heard them all too, you know—and more accurately than most of the others."

He tilted his head thoughtfully. "You're Celeste?"

"Yes," she said tightly.

He nodded. "Can I ask you a question?"

_Great_, she thought, _I went and told him who I was, and now he's going to ask me some stupid question about my parents, just like all the other newborns._

She seriously considered telling him that, no, he couldn't ask her a question, and he could just go off and talk to one of the hundreds of other newborns if he wanted, thank you very much; she was sure they'd be happy to chat things up with him. Then she saw the small bruise on his forehead, a little bloody still. It looked pretty bad. She supposed she owed him enough to answer one question.

"I guess you can," she answered stiffly.

"Have you ever caught a Tiger Moth?"

"Well, why don't you just ask—wait, what?" she shook her head, not sure that she heard him right.

"Well, I kind of know what you mean," he said, "about the questions and everything. People always try to get me to talk about my father too—all his time in the jungle with Shade and everything…"

"Wait," she stopped him, "you're Chinook's son?"

He shrugged indifferently. "So, have you ever caught a Tiger Moth before?"

She just stared at him, at a complete loss for words.

"I've heard they're really hard to get," he continued, "and I've given it a few tries before, but they always seem to get away at the last second. Have you ever caught one?"

He was giving her his full attention, and it was so unusual for her that she wasn't sure she liked it at first. Was he really waiting for an answer? He did look pretty expectant…

"Well…" she began slowly.

He nodded encouragingly and without any further hesitation, she dived right into her story, careful to enjoy every detail of her exciting battle with the elusive moth. He listened and nodded attentively along the way, and it felt so good to finally have someone asking about her own life for a change. She eagerly answered every question he threw her way, often remembering some other escapade and quickly jumping into another tale.

She could tell that he wasn't just trying to be nice either—the way his face changed with each sentence told her that he really was interested in what she had to say, which was something she never would've thought possible. Generally she had to mention her father a least a few times to maintain anyone's interest.

As the night grew on, her new acquaintance started sharing some of his own stories, speaking with as much relish as she had, and even joking a little. They continued to swap their greatly embellished tales with each other well into the night, laughing at their exaggerated victories and maybe even talking about their parents just a little bit. With each passing word, Celeste began to feel confident that this was going to be the start of a wonderful friendship.


End file.
